


algernon

by parsnipit



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alternate Universe - Baby Blasters (Undertale), Alternate Universe - Gaster Blaster (Undertale), Angst, Child Abuse, Controlled Transformations, Dadster, Family Fluff, Gaster Blaster Papyrus (Undertale), Gaster Blaster Sans (Undertale), Gen, Good W. D. Gaster, Hurt/Comfort, Parent-Child Relationship, Recovery, Slow Burn, Unethical Experimentation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2020-07-23 04:43:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 35
Words: 267,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20002504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parsnipit/pseuds/parsnipit
Summary: Dr. W.D. Gaster wants to create a weapon—a soulless, non-sentient creature capable of killing any human that should fall into the Underground. What he creates is a child.___Alternatively: the one wherein Dr. Gaster accidentally becomes a single father raising twoskeleton werewolveschildren.





	1. lo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: experimentation, (unintentional) child neglect
> 
> “I dint know mice were so smart.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

On October 15th, Dr. W.D. Gaster creates a beast. It isn’t large, at first—merely a blob of white magic and DNA, hardly bigger than a cell and visible only underneath his microscope’s polished lens. He keeps it in a small vial of DT/M50 solution, which is constantly filtered and replenished to provide the zygote with both determination and an external magic source. The first twelve attempts had all died within their first month of life, due to concentrations of DT/M50 that were either too low, too high, or too unstable. Mistakes are inescapable, and Gaster knows this. Still, twelve is—a bit much, if you ask him. A waste of valuable resources.

He’s determined that this thirteenth beast will survive—so it sits in an incubator right beside his desk, and it grows. 

It makes it through the first month. 

The second month he can see it with the naked eye. It’s still not large—hardly bigger than a pea, but it’s _there,_ and alive, and—

He’s proud. Asgore will be pleased with him, if this pans out.

The third month it’s even larger, at a successful five inches. It’s starting to take shape, too. No longer just a formless blob of magic—he can see bones. A delicate, transparent femur tucked near the miniscule curve of its ribs. The little knobs of vertebrae, a whip-thin tail. A fragile skull with the world’s tiniest fangs. It almost makes him want to laugh. This? This is the prototype of a beast designed to slaughter humans? It’s just—so— _small._

He moves it from the vial to a larger flask.

By the fourth month, it’s a few inches larger, and it’s beginning to move. Its paws twitch, its tail flicks, and it opens and shuts its mouth—a suckling reflex, no doubt. He wonders where it got that from. Skeletons don’t nurse. Blasters certainly don’t. He spends more time than he should watching it. Of course, as he does, he takes meticulous notes on its movement and development, and increases the DT/M50 concentrations accordingly. Larger bodies need more determination, more magic, to sustain them, and if this beast grows the way Gaster wants it to—

Well, needless to say, the kingdom is going to spend a surplus of funds purchasing DT/M50.

In the fifth month, the beast begins to respond to sounds. Gaster realizes this as he’s proofing some of his papers. He plays soft jazz in his office on habit—the noise helps him concentrate. Several minutes into his editing, however, the pulse of the beast’s magic increases. He glances up, checks the vitals display that always sits beside the incubator. The magic pulse is measured by a small wire connected to the beast’s sternum, and it appears, upon first inspection, to be properly connected. Nor is the beast moving overly much, so he assumes the pulse’s increase isn’t due to unnecessary strain—unless the beast is falling ill. He feels a bit ill himself, thinking that. He’s spent so much _time,_ he’s invested so much _hope—_

He turns the jazz off. The beast’s pulse slows. He turns it back on. The pulse increases. 

Huh.

From then on, he always tries to keep soft music playing in the background. Whoever said a beast couldn’t appreciate classical Mozart or spiffy Duke Ellington? He also speaks to it, at times. Who else is he going to speak to, after all? His office is a lonely place—and he likes it that way, certainly, but—

But, well, it’s nice to have an unconditional listener, sometimes—especially one he needn’t translate for constantly.

He tells it about his research into quantum physics, about his lunches with Asgore, about his meetings with Alphys and his coworkers. “They’re all very excited to see you,” he says, and the beast’s legs stretch as it yawns, clearly enthused with the conversation. “We’ve never had one that survived so long. You’ve met Jackson, of course—he’s the little ambitious one who comes to monitor you at night, along with Lucky. Smart, those two. A little unoriginal, but smart. I wouldn’t let them monitor you otherwise, you know. And then you’ve met Alphys, but you were very tiny back then. It was almost three months ago, I think. She’ll be impressed with how you’ve grown. And Asgore!” He huffs out something that's almost a laugh. “Oh, Asgore’s going to love you. He’s been excited about this project for a very long time. He was the one who initially requested it, you know, so you have him to thank for your existence.”

The beast yawns again. Ah, the joys of an unconditional listener.

Alphys comes to visit at the start of six month. When she sees the beast, she gasps, her eyes going round. “Oh, Dr. Gaster—oh, my goodness. It’s g-gotten a lot larger, hasn’t it?”

“It has,” Gaster says, observing her fascinated expression with approval. This _is_ a fascinating project, after all, if not _the_ most fascinating. He’s no biologist, but—well, he thinks he might certainly see the appeal of becoming one. “It weighed a pound and a half yesterday. Perhaps not as heavy as most monsters in this stage of development, but then, it _is_ mostly bone.”

“And it moves!” She leans forward, bracing her hands on her knees so she can peer through the incubator’s glass front. “I read your last report—you said it responds to s-sound now, too?”

“It does. It seems particularly inclined to like Louis Armstrong.”

Alphys laughs. “Oh, you’re ruining h-him already.”

“Him?”

“S-sorry, sorry! It, I m-mean. Only, um—isn’t it a he, if it has y-your DNA? B-biologically speaking, anyhow, though I s-suppose that doesn't truly matter—”

Gaster taps a finger against his teeth. “Well—yes, I suppose. He. That will be fine. I don’t suppose it cares, either way. _He_ seems particularly inclined to like Louis Armstrong. I think he’s taken a liking to the trombone.”

Alphys shakes her head fondly. “Can you b-believe that? The first line of defense against humanity likes a human’s _j-jazz.”_

“There is a certain irony to it,” Gaster admits, crouching in front of the incubator. The beast opens and closes his mouth slowly. He almost looks like he’s smiling. Gaster’s own mouth tugs up at the edges.

“Does h-he respond to any visual stimuli yet?”

Gaster shakes his head. “No. I expect he’ll start soon, if all goes to plan. We’ll start testing at the end of the month, should eyelights appear.”

“How do you plan to t-test for it?”

“Simple stimuli—we’ll test for an eyelight response to light and dark, first, to ensure that the peripheral nervous system is intact and functioning. After that, I suppose we’ll see if he can focus on anything in his line of a sight. A toy, perhaps. Something colorful. Then we’ll…”

Gaster goes on to explain their ideas for testing to Alphys, who nods and listens and suggests her own ideas when he prompts her for them. The two of them shuffle over his reports, discussing the future of the project with excitement, until she has to leave a few hours later. Farther into the month, as Gaster had hoped, the beast’s eyelights appear. They appear gradually—a small fuzz of gray that flickers in and out for days at a time, until they finally solidify into little white dots.

“Well, look at you,” he says, crouching in front of the incubator with a penlight. He flashes the light across the beast’s eyes, and the eyelights shrink and swell accordingly. “Functioning responses, that’s a good sign. Can you see me?” He waves his hand in front of the incubator door. The beast’s eyelights follow it. Gaster almost grins—almost. “Good. Very good.”

A few days later, Asgore comes to visit. The beast has learned to close its eyesockets, and tends to do so while sleeping—though not always. Fortunately, both eyes are closed (he’s found that disturbs most people less) when the king arrives. Gaster meets him in the lab’s lobby, and—

“Wingdings!” Asgore crushes him into a tight hug, nuzzling one fuzzy cheek against Gaster’s. He’s shedding his winter coat already, and several white hairs end up embedded into the collar of Gaster’s shirt. “Hello, there. How have you been?”

Gaster pats Asgore’s arm, and the king graciously sets him back on his feet. “I’ve been well, Your Majesty. Yourself?”

“Oh, well enough.” He rubs his paws together. “I’m very excited to meet this pet project of yours. How is the little guy? Alphys told me he was getting pretty big.”

“So he is. Come, I’ll show you. Right this way,” Gaster says, leading the king down the hallway towards his office. “He’s two pounds, now, and has both vision and hearing intact. I assume his other senses will be equally intact, though those are difficult to test, as long as he remains in solution. He requires higher concentrations of DT/M50 almost daily, due to his rapid growth, and has yet to develop any magical abilities—which is as expected. He’ll probably be at least a year old before he can manage any attack or defense.”

“Just a _baby,”_ Asgore whispers, and Gaster is—regretting this, a little bit, already. It won’t do for anyone to get attached. It simply won’t do.

“He has no soul,” Gaster reminds him as he opens his office door and ushers Asgore inside. “He’s entirely non-sentient. He’s just an—extremely mobile rock, if you will.”

Asgore crouches in front of the incubator and makes an unintelligible sound Gaster translates to mean _oh my stars that's cute._ “That is _the most adorable_ mobile rock I have ever seen,” he says earnestly, resting a paw against the incubator’s glass. Gaster winces, but refrains from shooing him away because _germs,_ germs around his precious experiment, _germs._ “It looks like a—a puppy, or, er, if a puppy had a baby with a small dragon.”

“A most scientific description,” Gaster says, wry. He reaches for a bottle of disinfectant, rubbing some across his hands before offering the bottle to Asgore, who (thank the stars) takes it and massages some into the fur of his paws. 

“How old is he now? Six months?”

“Six months and ten days.”

“When do you plan to take him out of solution?”

“Ten months. I want to give him as much time to grow as I can, but I don’t want him to be in solution when he learns to use magic. In addition, his training will need to begin before he becomes too large to control easily.”

“How large will he become?”

“If you recall, this was the model we based his genome off of,” Gaster says, summoning a pool of magic from his soul. It dances into place, forms and solidifies into bones, into the full skeleton of a blaster that stands across the office from them. Asgore gapes, although he’s seen the model before—they ran over it time and time again before they settled on it as the prototype. “Eight feet at the shoulder, twenty-one feet from snout to tail-tip. Of course, that’s how large he’s _genetically_ predisposed to become. The environment always plays a factor. I hope it’s been ideal for his growth, but we won’t find out until he reaches maturity.”

“And how long until he reaches that?”

“Only a few years, I hope, but—again, this is a prototype. There are lots of unknowns involved.” He waves a hand and the blaster model dissipates, the magic flowing back to his soul.

“It’s incredible.” A furry paw comes to rest on his skull. “What you’re doing here. It really is incredible, Wingdings. I’m very pleased with your work. I tell ya, a guy couldn’t ask for a better Royal Scientist.”

“Ah.” Gaster’s mouth tugs towards a smile. “Thank you, Your Majesty. I appreciate it.”

“Anytime.” The paw moves, like it’s trying to ruffle hair Gaster doesn’t have. “Now—does the little guy have a name?”

Gaster frowns. “No, I’m afraid not. Again, he’s—non-sentient, Your Majesty. He isn’t a monster, so we’ve refrained from naming him. Names make it easier to become attached, and attachment isn’t what you want, with an experiment like this. He’s a weapon. You know that. For data purposes, we’ve been referring to him as Gaster’s Blaster Prototype 01—GBP01.”

“Well, that’s not a fun name.” Asgore squints at the incubator. “I think he looks more like a Sam, or a Buddy.”

Gaster rubs his temples. 

“Will there be more?”

“Hm?” Gaster glances over. “No. No, not yet. We need to gather data from the prototype before we try again. Improvements will doubtlessly need to be made. Here—” Gaster stands, stretching his spine. “Would you like to help me move him? I’m transferring him from the flask to a larger beaker for the next couple of months.”

Asgore practically springs to his feet, clasping his hands in front of him. “Oh, I’d love to help! That sounds very exciting. How—how do we do it?”

First, they scrub down in the sink, using antibacterial soak. After that, Gaster offers Asgore a freshly-sterilized lab coat, and they both pull on blue surgical gloves. Gaster gathers a large beaker, fresh from the autoclave, and sets it down on top of the incubator. He spritzes everything liberally with diluted bleach, then quickly sets up the DT/M50 filter and insert (there are two sets of tubes for each bucket of solution, for this express purpose) before he unplugs the tubes running into the beast’s current flask. Movement must happen quickly, after that, lest the concentrations in DT/M50 change too drastically. 

Gaster opens the incubator and removes the flask—the movement stirs the beast awake, and it opens its eyes and watches them both carefully. Asgore coos. Together, the two of them carefully tip the solution (and the beast within it) into the larger beaker. Gaster takes care to keep the angles slight, so that the beast slides into the beaker rather than splashing into it. Too much movement would disturb it, so he does his best to keep the process quick and smooth. After that, he seals the beaker and slides it back into the incubator. Asgore peels off his gloves and coat as Gaster resets the DT/M50 levels for the bigger container. 

After that, Asgore whisks him off to dinner and a show at the newest hotel in the capital. The food is grand, and the play is interesting, but—

But the whole time, Gaster only wants to be back in the lab, working on his projects—working on the beast.

During the seventh month, the beast’s bones begin to harden, and he grows ever more rapidly—he jumps from two pounds to four, and from seven inches to thirteen. The higher concentrations of DT/M50 actually appear to distress him, as after they’ve been upped, his pulse spikes and doesn’t settle. Gaster brings the concentrations back down, and homeostasis resumes. It appears the concentrations required for survival and growth have settled—finally, Gaster thinks. At the rate they were going, the beast would’ve soon been downing three gallons of solution a day. Ridiculous, even for a fully-grown blaster, let alone something this small. 

At eight months, the beast is five pounds and seventeen inches from crown to tail-tip. He’s beginning to respond even more to his environment. He wags his tail when he sees Gaster—or when he hears jazz. Gaster swears that strange, draconic skull can smile. He also takes to touching the tip of his muzzle to the edges of the beaker, to the lid, to the base. He seems—curious, Gaster thinks. Undeniably curious. That’s good. Curiosity means intelligence, and intelligence means he’ll be easier to train. (Leastways, that’s what Gaster hopes.)

At nine months, the beast stays awake for longer periods of time—sometimes up to an hour, when Gaster is in the office and speaking to him. “...so we’ll start with simple obedience first,” Gaster explains to him, one day. The beast functions well as a board to bounce ideas off of. “Sit, stay, down—those types of things. I imagine it will be a bit like training a puppy. After that we can move onto more complex instructions, such as using magical attacks. I’ve found a book on the humans’ military K9 operations, and I believe it will be remarkably helpful. Here—would you like me to read it to you? I’ve already finished the first few chapters, but I’m sure you’ll catch on. ‘Public setting training is vital for all military operational dogs. It reduces the risk of distraction while working in the field, and ensures civilian safety by….’”

He finishes the book within the day. After that, he has to scrounge the libraries for more information on animal behavior and training—a rather limited topic, in the Underground, since few people have pets. He takes thorough notes on what books he does find, and shares his findings with the beast when he can. Thinking out loud, if you will. He’s fully aware that the beast doesn’t understand or care about his research, but that’s alright. If nothing else, it’s familiarizing the beast with his mannerisms and voice, which his books assure him will make training easier. Well, most of his books, anyhow—some have, er, rather _conflicting_ ideas about training. A few say that he needs to begin asserting himself as the alpha of the ‘pack’ already, lest the beast turn on him and become unwieldy. 

Somehow, he gets a feeling that these books are rather outdated.

“Besides,” he tells the beast one day, leaning against the incubator. “It isn’t as though blasters have pack dynamics. Do they?” He leans his head against the glass front. “I suppose we’ll find out.”

Because the thing is, the blasters he creates with his magic aren’t _real._ The knowledge of them, their shape and biology and power, is a genetic understanding embedded in his DNA. Every skeleton instinctively knows how to form a blaster, though indeed it takes practice and prowess to be able to do so successfully. Nevertheless, the blasters a skeleton summons in battle aren’t sentient creatures. They’re merely magic, taken form in an ancient shape. They have no will, no free thought. They’re weapons—just as this beast will be. The only difference is that this beast isn’t connected to his magic. Instead, the beast survives off of external magic, making him infinitely more valuable—because even if Gaster dies, as long as the beast has _some_ source of available magic, he will continue to live. However, Gaster supposes that the beast’s independence from him may result in certain biological imperatives coming into play—without a skeleton’s control, what _is_ a blaster?

He’s excited to discover the answer.

The tenth and final month sees the beast up to eight pounds and twenty-two inches. He still sleeps most of the time, but when he’s awake, he watches everything with sleepy curiosity. He’s taken to putting his paws against the side of the glass whenever Gaster nears him. On occasion, Gaster will place his hand on the glass over them, and the beast smiles that odd animal smile. 

The day they remove the beast from solution is absolutely terrifying. Gaster’s gone over the schematics and procedures again and again—he knows the plan as well as he knows the beast’s genetic code (which is to say, very damn well, since he spent years modifying it from the genetic blueprints embedded within his own DNA). Despite his precautions and research, he still feels sick with uncertainty as they remove the beast, for the last time, from the incubator. They set the enormous beaker inside of the beast’s first home—a small, heated room near Gaster’s own lab. Near the back of the room is a filtered pool of warm DT/M50 solution. Hopefully the beast will be aware of his own body—enough so to go and immerse himself into the pool whenever he feels weak, anyhow. 

Beside the pool is a bowl of finely-mashed chicken meal; it’s part of a diet prepared specifically by their nutritionist to provide the beast with all the energy he should need, outside of his DT/M50 requirements. If he can metabolize monster food, they’ll be one step closer to success, especially if it helps cut back on his DT/M50 consumption. On the other side of the pool is a mobile vitals’ system, prepped and ready to be connected to the beast as soon as possible. Gaster rubs his hands together. The blue latex of his gloves sticks and clings. 

“Well,” he says, and his team comes to attention—four white-coated, freshly-sterilized monsters with hope gleaming in their eyes. “Let us begin.”

Two of his assistants gently set the beaker of solution the beast is in next to the pool and tip it onto its side. The beast opens his eyes, stirring sleepily. Gaster kneels beside the beaker and carefully uncaps it. Excess solution trickles into the pool, and the beast’s paws jerk when his skull touches dry air for the first time. His eyelights widen. “There we are,” Gaster murmurs, and the beast’s eyes search for him. “You’re alright.”

He reaches inside—moves swiftly, smoothly, tries his best not to touch the beast any longer than he must—and curls his fingers around the beast’s shoulders. The beast squirms, still slow and weak, but Gaster feels each movement like an earthquake in the palm of his hand. He pulls the beast out of the beaker and slides him into the pool, where solution swirls around him again. The beast relaxes, but Gaster coaxes his skull up and out of the solution and rests it on the side of the pool, instead. It’s best if he begins to adjust to a dry environment before he becomes too attached to the solution. 

Once the beast is safely in the pool, Gaster and his last assistant rush to attach the vitals’ wires. A wire to his sternum, to measure the pulse of his magic through his skeleton. A wire to his first phalanx to measure the oxygen saturation of his bones. A wire to his second phalanx to measure the DT/M50 saturation of the same. A wire coiled around a rib to measure body temperature. The beast tolerates all of this without moving more than an inch—no doubt he’s still struggling to adjust to his new environment. 

The assistants sweep away the old incubator and beaker, and Gaster sits with his creation for a couple of hours, ensuring that he adjusts well. Most of the time, the beast simply lays, immersed to his shoulders in solution, and sleeps. But he survives the transfer and that, to Gaster, counts as an immediate success. After a few weeks, however, there’s still been no change in the beast’s activity level. Of course, Gaster wasn’t expecting a drastic jump in activity, but it seems as though there’s even _less,_ now. It’s—worrisome, to say the least. The beast doesn’t eat or drink, either, despite a constant supply of fresh food and water. 

“What are we going to do with you?” he asks the beast, near the end of the eleventh month. The beast opens one eye and regards him sleepily, content to snooze and survive off of solution and nothing else. Gaster folds his arms across his chest. How to encourage him to eat, to move, to interact with his environment? Well—well, how did humans raise orphaned puppies? That’s similar to this, Gaster thinks. The beast has no parents or siblings to show him how to live, so that duty falls to Gaster and his team.

Gaster goes to get a bottle.

A few hours later, he’s sitting next to the pool, the beast’s chin cupped in one gloved hand. The bottle—made mainly of glass, such that it can be put through the autoclave to be sterilized—is filled with the same chicken meal in the beast’s bowl, watered down with copious amounts of a warmed milk replacer. It smells absolutely atrocious. He has a small, needleless syringe filled with the same horrid concoction, should the beast prove unable to suckle. 

“Alright,” Gaster murmurs, fitting the nipple of the bottle between the beast’s little fangs. “Let’s try this, then. I know you have a suckling reflex—don’t try to fool me. I saw you sucking air earlier, you scoundrel.”

But the beast doesn’t suckle. He chews for a moment, then shifts his head away, unperturbed. Gaster sighs.

“Of course. Don’t try to make it easy on me.” Gaster picks up the syringe, next, and fits it between the teeth near the back of the beast’s jaw. He pushes a small amount of liquid into the beast’s mouth, and sees it vanish in a flush of soft white magic. The beast’s eyesockets widen. “Yes? Pretty good, right?” 

The beast turns his head back, mouthing at the syringe until Gaster obligingly presses the rest of the formula into his jaws. Then he scoops up the bottle again, presses the nipple to the corner of the beast’s mouth. The beast turns his head on instinct, fits his frontmost fangs around the nipple, and sucks. Gaster doesn’t laugh with delight—certainly not. That would be undignified of him. 

He just—smiles, a little bit.

After that, the beast’s meals are delivered solely through bottle-feedings. He teaches Jackson and Lucky the precise steps to take during feedings, and sees to it that the beast is fed consistently five times each day. To his delight, he discovers that the extra energy from the food is quickly metabolized. The beast resumes his rapid growth, and he begins displaying more movement. Still, he can’t move outside of solution, and Gaster decides that’s simply something he’ll have to help him with, too.

One year after the beast’s creation as a single-celled zygote, Gaster begins teaching it to walk. Each morning, an hour after his first feeding, Gaster will scrub himself down with disinfectant and then remove the beast from the pool. The beast protests this most heartily, the first few times. He squirms and whines and whimpers and altogether makes Gaster feel like a terrible no-good person. To counteract this, Gaster moves feedings back and begins offering the beast’s first meal of the day only when he’s outside of the pool. 

Pavlov was a clever human. Gaster has to give him that.

Before long, the beast looks forward to being outside of the pool. Gaster lays him out on the floor just in front of it and holds the bottle up, encouraging the beast to stretch his neck. As he feeds, Gaster uses his free hand to guide the beast’s limbs through a wide range of motions, strengthening his joints and (in theory) triggering more magic to flow to those seldom-used areas. After a few weeks of this, the beast surprises him by climbing out of the pool on his own, one morning. He’s slow and clumsy, and he holds himself close to the ground, wobbling unsteadily—hardly more than a crawl, but Gaster is absolutely delighted with the progress. 

By the time the beast is fifteen months old, he can walk and trot (mostly) without stumbling. Running proves to be a bit more difficult, but Gaster chalks that up to new-living-creature clumsiness. However, with such new movements come new challenges. Gaster can barely squeeze through the room’s door before he’s got a beast squirming at his feet, whining with excitement. In addition, as the beast continues to grow and survive, more and more people want to see him. He can’t blame them, but having so many people trekking in and out of the room makes him uneasy—he doesn’t want the beast falling ill if someone was improperly sanitized, and he doesn’t want all of the attention to disturb the beast’s as-of-yet uncertain psyche. Still, he can’t very well refuse everyone who wants a chance to observe and take notes, but he does his best to limit the traffic through the room when he can.

Asgore comes to visit one afternoon, and he nearly falls over himself trying to snuggle Gaster’s beast. The beast seems thrilled with the attention, squirming in Asgore’s arms and snuffling against his face and throat. “Oh my goodness,” Asgore whispers. “Oh my stars. Wingdings. I want one. I need one.”

Gaster looks fondly at the king, sliding down to sit against the far wall. The beast squirms out of Asgore’s arms and bounds over to him, dropping into a position Gaster recognizes from a few of his canine behavior books—a playbow. Obligingly, Gaster taps a hand on the floor, allowing the beast to pounce at (though never to land on) it. Encouraging hunting instincts will be beneficial, he thinks, especially when it comes to the beast’s future job—hunting the enemy. 

“I’m afraid they’re not pet material,” Gaster says. “He’s not dangerous now, but once he gets larger—” Gaster shakes his head. “No. He’s not a pet at all.”

“But he’s so _cute,”_ Asgore whispers, looking adoringly at the beast.

“Cute things can be dangerous.” Looking at the king himself, Gaster knows that’s true.

“Well, I suppose you’re right about that.” Asgore’s mouth twists, his eyes darkening for a moment before he shakes himself off. “Nevertheless—how _is_ he, Wingdings? I know you mentioned teaching him magical attacks once he was a year old. How has that been going?”

Gaster shakes his head. “I’m afraid it hasn’t been. His growth is much slower than I’d anticipated, and he hasn’t shown any signs of manifest magic yet. I’ve only just started his obedience training, but that’s been going well. He’s very clever. Watch—01, pay attention.” The beast’s eyes snap to him, animal grin in place. “Sit.” The beast’s haunches touch the ground, and Gaster flicks a piece of soft hamburger towards him. It gets snapped out of the air. “Very good. Down.” The beast lays down, tail thumping expectantly. Another piece of hamburger. “ Stand.” The beast (rather less enthusiastically) clambers back to his feet. Two pieces of hamburger, for that. Lazybones.

“He _is_ doing well,” Asgore says, and Gaster preens (just a little bit) under the praise. “What a good boy he is. Aren’t you?” He coos at the beast, who paces around him in delight. “Yes you aaare, you’re the good boy, it’s youuu. Such a clever little monster you are. Oh, Wingdings, can’t I give him some more hamburger?”

How can Gaster deny a royal request when it’s asked so nicely? (And when it comes with not one but _two_ sets of puppy-dog eyes?) He sighs and hands Asgore the packet of hamburger. The beast’s tail wags furiously. He’s always very happy when Asgore comes to visit, after that, the gluttonous thing. 

Eighteen months into the beast’s existence, and Gaster thinks things are going remarkably well. A little slower than he would have preferred, perhaps, but that’s alright. He’ll simply have to figure out a way to speed the growth of the next generation—which may be coming soon, if Jackson has his way. He’s been clamoring for a few new beasts the last couple of months, and Gaster is inclined to create some for him. He’s drafted some changes he believes might help with growth and development. All that’s left is to edit them into the genome, seed the DNA with magic, and then incubate the resulting zygote. The second generation’s genome is already in progress, as a matter of fact. A few more months and they’ll have more beasts around, he hopes—the whole lab hopes. 

Eighteen months into the beast’s existence, and he can walk and trot and run and jump. He responds to an incredible list of commands—sit, stay, stand, down, come, heel, place, speak, back up, off, leave it, wait, pay attention. He loves eating hamburger (and french fries, as Lucky had discovered early on, much to Gaster’s chagrin). His favorite toys are tug ropes (good for bite training) and squeaky balls (good for hunting). He’s still rather small, weighing in at only thirty pounds and measuring twenty inches at the shoulder and seventy-two from snout to tail-tip, but he’s always growing. He still needs the DT/M50 every few hours or his energy levels plummet, but he gets the rest of his nutrition from solid foods. 

Eighteen months into the beast’s existence, and Gaster is feeling hopeful about this whole thing. He’s created a beast. He’s created a beast that can walk and sense and learn. He thinks, perhaps, he’s created a beast that can kill a human—a beast that will be the first line of defense should a human fall into the Underground again, or the first line of attack after the Barrier is broken and monsters return to the surface. He’s created a beast that feels nothing but instinct. A beast that likes to play and interact and cooperate, so long as it gets something out of it, but a beast that, in truth, feels no love or hope or attachment. A beast that has no soul, no sentience. A beast that he needn’t feel bad about ordering to its death, in a fight against a human. Just a beast. Nothing more.

Eighteen months into the beast’s existence, and the beast learns to talk.

“Lo,” the beast tells him, one morning, watching him with that animal grin. “Lo, ‘aster.”

Eighteen months into the beast’s existence, and Gaster’s project is ruined.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks for reading the first chapter of "algernon!" i hope you enjoyed it!! the title is taken from a novel by daniel keyes called "flowers for algernon," which is a fantastic read about intellectual disabilities, the quest for knowledge over love, and the ethics of experimentation on living creatures. i hope to have the next chapter of this fic up soon, but i haven't written the entire thing out, so i can't promise a quick update schedule. hopefully i'll be able to post the next chapter within the next few weeks, though! i'm super excited about this story!! :D
> 
> fun fact: since sans was created on october 15th, he's a libra, the symbol for which is the scales (in reference to sans' justice/judgement theme). (gaster is a gemini.)


	2. find him a father

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: (unintentional) child neglect, discussions of unethical experimentation
> 
> “Results are often negative. We learn what something is not—and that is as important as a positive discovery to the man who is going to pick up from there. At least he knows what not to do.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

The beast’s font is Comic Sans. Where did that come from? Was it a dormant code in Gaster’s genome? Something that should have rightfully been passed to his children, if he had any? Or was it simply an error in editing the genome—an unwanted mutation? A result of deactivating the skeleton phenotype instead of removing it entirely? Gaster doesn’t know. He supposes it doesn’t matter now. What matters is that—is that—

The beast is intelligent. Uncannily so. Gaster knew that from the beginning, but he thought it was simply animal intelligence—the cunning of a fox, the earnest curiosity of a working dog. Worthy of respect on its own, of course, but—but animals don’t speak, not with _intent._ Parroting is a different matter, so maybe—maybe the beast is simply parroting what he’s heard before? But no. No, that couldn’t be. Gaster is certain the beast has never heard anyone say, “Hello, Gaster,” before. Leastways, not enough to mimic it. Gaster, on the other hand—

Well, that’s how he greets the beast, every morning. “Hello, 01.”

That the beast should know 01 to refer to himself? That the beast should know Gaster refers to _Gaster?_ That isn’t parroting. That’s communication. What’s more, animals don’t communicate in Common, and certainly not in Wingdings—and they especially don’t have a _font of their own._ To know that the beast is as sentient as an animal is one thing, and a thing Gaster has been suspecting for a while, despite the disappointment it brings him; ideally, a weapon should not possess any level of sentience, no matter how minor. Any creature that can think and feel must be treated with a certain degree of respect, but Gaster—

Gaster could have sent an animal to its death, in a fight against a human. He would have felt terrible about it, but in the end, it could be done, especially if the animal’s death meant a monster’s survival. Perhaps that’s a flaw in his own moral stature. He doesn’t want to think about it. Animal sentience is one thing—and an important thing, one that will have to change the way they create the next few beasts—but _this_ level of sentience and intelligence?

It reminds him of an infant monster’s. 

He couldn’t send a child to its death, in a fight against a human. That’s the difference. A child’s life must be valued above all else—precisely why he never had a child himself, despite being the sole survivor of his species. He can’t imagine valuing anything more than his work. What’s more, a child is not a weapon and never _should_ be. He didn’t want the beast to be a child. He didn’t want the beast to be an _animal,_ let alone a monster. Perhaps the beast can’t love, but the fact is that he can think and feel and communicate. Something like that—

Something like that can’t be a mindless weapon.

Gaster’s really fucked this up.

The whole blaster project is _fucked up_ if he can’t find a way to reduce the next beasts’ sentience without making them utterly incapable of learning and obeying. Maybe the beasts don’t have souls, but they have _minds,_ and that alone is worth protecting. He can’t do this. He can’t use 01 as a weapon. That’s okay. That’s okay, right? He’s a prototype. He was bound to have flaws. Gaster can fix it, he can fix this, he can—

He can slide down to sit against the wall of 01’s room, wheezing into his palms. What has he done? What has he _done,_ oh, fuck. Has he really created a soulless child and trapped it in a lab with no exposure to the outside world, teaching it to hunt and bite and obey? _Has he really just—?_ How in the _hell_ is he ever going to integrate the beast into society? He’s already too dangerous. Once he develops his magical abilities—

No. No no no no. The beast was never meant to live among civilians, but he can’t be raised _here._ This is no place for a child to grow up. No place at all.

“‘aster?” The beast cocks his head, watching Gaster fervently. Gaster’s eyes flicker to the black space between the beast’s ribs—an empty, empty darkness. Anything this intelligent should have a soul glowing there. Right now, the beast is driven only by what he wants. Fortunately, so far, that’s been the same thing Gaster wants. They want the beast to eat and learn and live. What happens when the beast wants something different? What happens if what he wants involves hurting someone, and there’s no soul to stop him? “‘aster?”

“Hello, 01,” Gaster whispers. “It’s alright.”

It is the _most fucking not-alright in the world._

“I have to—” He presses a palm to the wall, hauls himself back onto shaky legs. The beast watches him—not with concern (he would need a soul, for that) but with curiosity. “I have to go. I’ll be back in just a moment.”

He stumbles towards the door and wrenches it open. The beast skitters along behind him, whining—no doubt he’s agitated that Gaster hasn’t given him his morning meal yet. Gaster moves to push the beast back into the room with a foot (gently!), but before he can, the beast darts out into the hallway. _Shit._ Just what he needed.

The beast has escaped before, naturally. He’s too clever to be pinned up in a single room for months on end. Gaster realizes, now, that trapping him in was a form of cruelty. Isolation. Deprivation. He feels sick. The beast bolts down the hallway, claws clicking against the tile, yapping with excitement. He looks back at Gaster, his tail wagging. 

“Come,” Gaster says, and the beast comes. He scoops him up, carrying him back to his room and depositing him into the pool of solution. “Stay. You have to stay here. You’re too—” Too dangerous, too unpredictable, too _soulless—“_ too little to be running around outside. Here.” He dumps the beast’s breakfast—pork meal and scrambled eggs—into his bowl, and the beast falls hungrily upon it.

While the beast is distracted, Gaster makes his escape back to his office. He paces anxiously in front of his desk, flapping his hands. Shit. Shit shit shit shit. How is he going to fix this? He can’t very well create a soul for the beast. But perhaps the beast could be _taught_ morals and ethics? Perhaps he doesn’t need to feel love in order to see that being good is the right thing to do? _Surely_ that’s possible? Gaster has met several monsters with incredibly low empathy who’ve also been incredibly fair and good. (Of course, even those monsters were still capable of feeling love, though perhaps it was difficult at times.) 

But even if that were so, and the beast could be taught morality, how would he survive outside of the lab? A soul is more than simply a monster’s compassion and love; it functions as the source of their internal magic. Because he lacks any internal magic, 01 survives solely off of external magic sources—namely, the DT/M50 solution. Without it, he’ll die in mere days. Nor is DT/M50 readily (or inexpensively) available outside of a laboratory setting. Living outside of the lab seems—seems impossible, but keeping him _in_ the lab? In that little room, without being able to interact with anyone lest he hurt them? That’s—Gaster can’t—he won’t—

Oh, stars, he needs to get away.

Gaster stumbles out of the lab, waving off the receptionist’s concerned questions, and heads for the Riverperson. They look quietly at him as he boards and forces himself to speak. “Snow—Snowdin, please.”

They go to Snowdin. 

“Tra la la—some of the hounds in Snowdin can melt,” the Riverperson advises him, and Gaster feels ill.

He thanks the Riverperson as he disembarks, then staggers through several heavy drifts of snow and into the town. His loafers are soaked and soggy within moments, ill-equipped for the rugged Snowdin terrain, and he’s grateful—not for the first time—that his lack of skin means sensation and temperature are muted for him. The glare of artificial light reflects off of the crisp white snow, searing Gaster’s eyesockets until he’s squinting. Wind tugs irritably at his shirt—a simple, thin purple button-up that he’d chosen this morning because he hadn’t expected to have a monumental moral crisis and flee to Snowdin in the middle of the workday.

He’s beyond grateful when the warm glow of Grillby’s bar comes into view. Belous waves one furry paw at him, and Gaster dredges up a weak smile. “Hey there, Dr. Gaster. Long time no see,” she says. “How are you?”

“Well enough,” he says, signing along with his words. Most monsters know at least a little bit of Hands—certainly more of them know it than know how to understand his accent—and Belous is no exception. “How are you?”

“I’m glad to hear it—I’ve been doing wonderfully, myself. Politics are interesting this year. I hear King Asgore has been spending a lot of time down at the lab.” She peers curiously at him. “Any idea what that’s about?”

“The king does like to check up on the projects he’s requested from time to time,” Gaster admits, inching in the direction of the door. “I’m certain it’s nothing to be concerned about.”

“Well, if you say so, doc. Take care, alright?”

“Certainly. You as well, Belous.” 

He ducks into the bar, exhaling softly as a wave of warmth and light surrounds him. Several of the patrons greet him cheerfully, and he returns their greetings as best he can, shuffling towards the bar. Grillby glances up, busily polishing a glass. He inclines his head as Gaster slumps onto a stool, groaning. The elemental snaps and crackles sympathetically, then slides a mug of steaming gray tea towards him. Gaster curls his fingers around it. They’re shaking. They clack noisily against the purple ceramic. He holds the cup more tightly before gulping the tea down. Grillby graciously refills it before he can ask.

Around him, the soft chatter of voices and music ebb and flow. 01 would like it here, Gaster thinks. He seems to like people, and Gaster _knows_ he likes music. For a few moments, Gaster simply lets himself focus on the external. It smells like smoke and greasy food. It sounds like someplace loud and unprofessional—someplace that definitely isn’t the lab. He sees different monsters, smiling and talking and joking. He sees Grillby, flickering warmly as he serves his patrons. He tastes the tea, hot and bitter. It’s okay. The world still exists, and it’s okay. 

He’s made a mistake. Now he’s going to fix it. The only question is— _how?_

If he told Asgore, surely the king could supply him with enough DT/M50 to have 01 raised, even outside of the lab. Asgore won’t want to hurt a child any more than Gaster himself does. If they do that, they’re no better than the enemy. But _who_ would raise 01? Not Gaster. Oh, no, not Gaster. He’s much too busy to raise an infant, and he’s not exactly—well, he’s not exactly parent material. 

Whoever _does_ raise 01 will have to have considerable HP and DF, in case 01 should decide to attack. They would have to have a keen mind—enough so to keep 01 properly trained and stimulated—and immense patience. All children require patience, of course, but 01 will be an extraordinary challenge to socialize and manage. In addition, there would be considerable pressure on his caretaker to teach him proper ethics, such that he could—even while soulless—grow up to be a functioning member of society. 

It’s a tall order. A very, very tall order.

Gaster’s first choice would be Asgore. As a boss monster, Asgore would likely be able to hold his own against 01 if he _did_ decide to do something unscrupulous. What’s more, Asgore is one of the kindest monsters Gaster knows. No doubt he could pass those traits onto 01. But—but Asgore has already lost two children. Gaster would feel awful giving him another child, especially one whose future is so uncertain—after all, who knows what 01’s life span is? Who knows if he can ever learn to be a part of society? Would Gaster just be setting Asgore up for more disappointment and pain? He can’t bear that. But perhaps—

Perhaps, as a temporary solution, Asgore is the one to talk to. At the very least, he can help Gaster find a permanent parent for 01.

(He thinks on Toriel, briefly. Undoubtedly, she meets all of his qualifications—but she lives so far away that if something _did_ happen with 01, who could help her? Besides, the Ruins are the first place humans go through. She has enough danger to deal with without Gaster foisting a soulless, overpowered child onto her.)

He sips his third mug of tea more slowly, staring contemplatively into the gray abyss of liquid. The beast, without a soul, also lacks stats—he has no set HP, no LV, no EXP, no DF or AT. As long as he has a supply of magic in his bones, acquired from the DT/M50, he won’t dust. Hurting others will have no effect on him. It would be much the same as hurting a tug toy, to him. His DF and AT are also undoubtedly reflected by the level of DT/M50 he’s consumed. If Gaster could cut back on that, then the beast would weaken. He would be safer to manage. But—but he would also be sicker. His growth would halt. He would grow weary. It would be akin to cutting off a child’s food supply. No. Gaster can’t do that. It simply isn’t ethical. 

Fortunately, the beast hasn’t learned to use magic attacks yet. If he can be trained—if he can be _taught—_ ethics before he develops those attacks, then perhaps he won’t be too dangerous. That means Gaster needs to start teaching now. Today. He’s waited far too long already. He’ll need to talk to Asgore immediately—he’ll be damned if _he_ knows how to teach a child anything, but surely Asgore knows. Asriel was nearly a perfect child, after all.

He downs the last of his tea, then stands. 

Grillby lifts his hands. _Better, old friend?_ he signs.

“Yes,” Gaster says, signing back at him. “Much. Thank you.”

Grillby inclines his head politely, and Gaster takes his leave. The Riverperson takes him back to Hotland (“Tra la la—I’ve seen them there, changing shape”) and from there, Gaster walks into New Home. His shoes dry out on the way. He stops by the lab briefly enough to grab his phone and videocall Asgore, who answers almost immediately. 

“Wingdings! You worried me,” he scolds as Gaster heads for 01’s room. He peeks in only long enough to assure himself that 01 is still present and safe, snoozing in the pool of solution. “Jackson called and said he couldn’t find you anywhere this afternoon, and you didn’t answer my calls—what were you up to?”

“I—had to do some thinking,” Gaster admits, heading out of the lab and towards the palace. He levitates the phone in front of him with his magic, signing his words out in front of the camera so the king can understand. “Your Majesty, I’ve made a mistake. May I speak with you today? I can be at the palace in half an hour.”

“So soon?” The worry in Asgore’s voice increases. “Is something the matter?”

“Yes. It’s about 01, from Project Blaster. I need your advice. Will you have time?”

Asgore pauses, his brow furrowing, and then says, “I’ll make time. You know I will, Wingdings.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty.” Gaster breathes a sigh of relief. Asgore fixes things. It’s what he _does._ “I’ll be there momentarily.”

When he reaches the palace, Gaster heads immediately for the house’s front door. Asgore answers on the first knock, ushering Gaster into the living room. “Welcome, welcome—I’m afraid I didn’t have time to prepare much, but I made a few things.” The table hosts a sprawl of delicacies: meats and cheeses and little hard candies. “So what brings you here? You’ve got me worried.”

“I’m sorry.” Gaster takes a seat at the table, and the king sits across from him. Ink stains the fur of his fingers—he must have been busy drafting regulations or signing legislation. Gaster doesn’t envy him. “Nothing is—immediately wrong. It’s just that 01 spoke today.”

Asgore’s mouth opens. Closes. Opens again to say, “He—spoke?”

“Yes. I didn’t know that he could. He wasn’t supposed to be able to. I designed him to be intelligent, but I didn’t think he would be intelligent enough to—to think of himself as an individual, to _speak,_ but—he does. He has. He said hello.”

“Hello.”

“Mm. He hasn’t ever babbled before, and he’s not even two, so this was—a bit of a surprise. He’s far more intelligent than I thought he was. He’s sentient, Your Majesty.”

“I know.”

“You know?”

“Of course. Why, the way he learns and plays—how could he not be sentient? But you knew that, Wingdings. So what’s different now?”

Gaster winces. He—did know the beast was sentient. He knew the moment the beast smiled at him. He just hadn’t wanted to admit it to himself, but there’s absolutely no ignoring it now. “I thought he had the sentience of an animal. That’s nothing to abuse, of course, but—I could have continued. I could have trained an animal to be a weapon. I could have raised an animal in the lab. But he—he _speaks._ And if he can do that now, when he’s barely eighteen months old, what will he be like as an adult? He’s certainly no animal.”

Asgore’s frown deepens, and he folds his paws in front of him. “Then he’s a—monster. A child.”

“I believe so.”

“Well. That is a problem. A child is—”

“—no weapon, I know. And he shouldn’t be raised in a lab. It’s not right.”

“No, it’s certainly not. What do you propose to do?”

“I need to get him out. I need someone to raise him, but he’s—dangerous. I designed him to be dangerous, and he doesn’t have a soul to tell him right from wrong, so whoever raises him will need to be strong, and just, and—”

“Oh, Wingdings.”

“—you’re the perfect candidate. It won’t be anything permanent. I’ll find someone else if you don’t want him, but just for now, I need to you take him. I need to get him out of the lab. Socialization needs to begin immediately if he has any chance of integrating into the community—”

“Oh, no, Wingdings.”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Asgore. I know you’ve been through enough, and another child is the last thing you want, but he needs—he needs _someone,_ and you’re _perfect.”_

Asgore rubs his paws across his face wearily.

“Like I said, it’s temporary. I’ll find someone else. I _will._ I just need time to ask around, and I need a better knowledge of how 01 acts outside of the lab. So just—for a few weeks, please, Asgore. Please.”

Asgore leans back in his chair. “Well, you’re—right. A child shouldn’t be raised in that lab. He needs socialization, he needs schooling and affection. I appreciate that you’re trying to find that for him. That was the right decision to make. And he’s—he’s a wonderful boy, he is. I don’t have a problem with him. But I can’t handle another child. Not again. Not alone. Not after what I’ve—” He takes a shuddering breath, staring at the stains on his hands. “No. I can’t be his father.”

“I understand that, Your Majesty. I’m not asking you to be his father. I’m asking you to be his temporary caretaker while I find him a father.”

“There’s no one else?”

“Well.” Gaster looks away. “There’s Toriel, if she would listen to me.”

Asgore is silent for a long moment. “I’ll take him.”

Relief floods him like a wave, cold and clean. “Thank you, Your Majesty. It’s just for a short time, I promise. I’ll get started on finding him a permanent home right away.” He stands, smoothing down his shirt and taking a piece of candy from the bowl on the table—it’s only polite. “I’ll bring him over tonight.”

“So soon?” Asgore’s eyes widen.

“Well, yes, preferably. I’d like to get him out of the lab as soon as possible. He could develop magical abilities any day now, and it’s best to have his socialization started before he becomes truly dangerous. I’m sure you agree?”

“I—yes, I suppose I do. Oh, angel above.” He scrubs his face with his paws again. “What have I gotten myself into?”

* * *

Gaster returns to the lab early that evening, after having been weaseled into an early dinner with Asgore, discussing the beast’s—the _child’s—_ personality and habits. He goes to gather a carrier from the supply room, first, and warms a packet of fish meal along the way. After that, he ducks into the child’s room. 

“Hello, 01,” he says, and the child springs to his feet, tail whipping back and forth when he sees Gaster. “I brought dinner.”

The child weaves between his ankles, wiggling in excitement, as Gaster empties the fish meal into his bowl. He falls upon it with gusto, as he always does, and Gaster sets the carrier in the corner of the room. He opens it, then tosses in a bite or two of the child’s favorite treat—warm, chewy hamburger. 

“We’re going to go on a trip tonight,” Gaster explains as the child eats in gulping bites. “I’m taking you over to King Asgore’s. Do you remember him? He’s the one who always feeds you hamburger. You like him very much. He’s going to be taking care of you for a few weeks, until I can find someplace permanent for you to stay. You’re going to have a family, and they’re going to teach you lots of good things. You’ll like it.”

The child sneezes, splattering fish meal across the wall and his snout. Gaster sighs and slips out of the room for a napkin. He waits until the child finishes eating, then wipes off his face, ignoring the annoyed huffs he gets in return. He leaves the room again to wash out the child’s bowl, packing it into his carrier bag, along with a manilla folder of care instructions and a vitals’ chart. He sets a few gallons of DT/M50 solution next to his office door, along with a few spray bottles of disinfectant and a vitals’ system, then returns for the child. 

“Lo!” the child says when he enters the room again. “Lo lo lo lo.”

“Yes, 01,” he says, just a tad amused. “Hello.” When he peaks into the carrier, he sees that the hamburger pieces have vanished. “I see you found those. Would you like some more?” He shows the child a bite of hamburger, then tosses it into the carrier. The child pads forward and snuffles at the edge of the carrier, then steps inside, leaning forward to snatch up the hamburger. Unfortunately, he only ducks his shoulders inside before stepping back out, so Gaster tries again. This time he throws the hamburger farther back, and the child steps fully into the carrier. Gaster snaps the door shut behind him.

“There we are,” he says. The child’s claws skitter across the bottom of the carrier as he twists around, whining. “It’s alright, I promise. You’re safe, and I’ll let you out in just a few moments.”

He doesn’t dare walk the child to Asgore’s, and he doesn’t fancy the idea of carrying the child’s unrestrained thirty pounds through the capital. Nor does he think 01 would respond well to being exposed to so many new sights and sounds at once—the carrier has solid sides, so it will limit the amount of stimulation he receives. It’s the safest option, although the child clearly isn’t thrilled about it. He whines more loudly, clawing at the carrier’s door. 

Gaster steps outside to let the child settle down for a moment. He loads the DT/M50 solution into his phone’s interdimensional box (a gift from Alphys), along with the miniature vitals’ system, disinfectant, his carrier bag, and several packets of meat meals. The child should be moved onto a more variable diet soon (a more _monster_ diet), but not all at once. He’ll have to instruct Asgore to let the child adapt to dietary changes slowly. Gaster steps back into the room, picks up the carrier, and—

And the child snarls. Gaster hears the clang of fangs against the metal bars of the door, and he immediately sets the carrier back down and kneels in front of it. The child has his fangs locked around the bars, and he lurches backwards, as though to tear the door from its hinges. The force of his jerks is enough to shake the carrier, and the bars bend under his bite. 

“No,” Gaster says—keeps his voice calm and steady, despite the sudden pounding in his soul. “01, leave it.”

The child narrows his eyes and leans forward, bearing down with his jaws. The bars creak. Perhaps he should have selected a stronger carrier.

_“Leave it.”_

01—for lack of a more scientific term—glares at him.

Gaster reaches forward—to push the child’s muzzle away from the bars, stupid, _stupid_ though the idea is—and 01 releases the bars. Gaster pauses. 01 lunges forward, slamming himself against the door with another vigorous snarl, mouth aimed for Gaster’s fingers. Thank the stars they were still a few inches away from the door, or he’s certain he would have lost them.

“Lo!” the child snaps. “‘aster _lo.”_

Gaster has the distinct feeling he’s just been insulted.

“No,” he repeats. “I am not letting you out of this carrier, 01. You will remain here until we reach Asgore’s, and _then_ I will let you go. The outside world is going to be overwhelming for you already. This will keep you safer and calmer. There is no need to bite things. I understand that this is all new, and that you’re nervous and upset, but this is not how we deal with those feelings.” He takes a deep breath and sighs, rubbing his forehead. “You can’t act this way, 01. You need to be good. You have to be good. I don’t know what’s going to happen to you otherwise.”

(A lie. Gaster knows exactly what will happen. 01 will be slaughtered.)

01’s shoulders hunch. Perhaps he can’t understand all of Gaster’s words, but certainly he understands the tone of them. 

“Alright. Let’s go, and we can get you out of this carrier.” Gaster stands again, picking up the carrier. The child growls, but he doesn’t bite again, and Gaster tries to think of that as a victory. (Somehow, he doesn’t think it is. 01 has never bitten before, not unless it was a game with a tug toy. He’s certainly never snapped at Gaster.) 

He heads out of the lab and into the capital streets, and the child falls silent—overwhelmed, no doubt, just as Gaster thought he would be. Gaster drapes a thin towel across the front of the carrier, blocking out the sights around the child. He hurries across the city, keeping his head held low and the carrier close to his side to draw less attention. He’s more than relieved when he arrives at Asgore’s and slips into the relative safety of the house.

“Welcome back,” Asgore says, leading him along to the living room again. Gaster sets the carrier down beside the armchair. “How was the trip?”

“Uneventful, for the most part. However, I’m inclined to think he doesn’t enjoy the carrier very much.” Gaster crouches in front of the carrier and folds the towel away from the door. 01 hunches in the back, his tail between his legs and his head held low. He’s trembling. Gaster’s soul wrenches. “There, now, it’s alright. We’re here. You needn’t be afraid. You may come out whenever you like.”

“Oh, poor boy.” Asgore clucks his tongue as Gaster opens the carrier’s door and leaves it open, backing away from it to give the child space. “Has he been in a carrier before?”

“No. I wish I’d had time to acclimate him, but a carrier was at the bottom of the list of ‘things 01 needs to acclimate to before he grows into his potential as an enormous genocidal weapon.’ I’m sure you understand.”

“Ah. Of course.”

“Here, let me go over some of these papers with you.” Gaster removes his files from his phone’s interdimensional box, rifling through them until he finds the papers he needs. He spreads them out on the table for Asgore to see. “These are his care instructions. He is to be fed five times a day—I’ve brought along to meals he’s used to, though I would like for more variety to be integrated eventually. I’ll draft a proposed schedule for dietary changes tonight. In the meantime, stick to these pre-portioned packets—where would you like me to put them?”

“The kitchen will be fine—yes, just there, that’s alright.”

“They’re simply different kinds of meat meal, but they contain all the nutrition he needs, and he enjoys them. The hamburger treats are strictly for training, which I would like for you to keep up with. However, I understand that you’re very busy, so if you get a little lax, I’m sure I can find time to come over and practice with him.”

“Certainly, certainly. I think he’d enjoy seeing you.”

“Try not to overdo it with the treats—he’ll eat whatever you give him, whether it’s good for him or not. Limit greasy or sugary foods, if you would, though a bite here and there won’t kill him. He also _must_ have DT/M50 solution readily available at all times.” Gaster sets down a few gallons of the solution in the kitchen. “Without it, he won’t survive. He has no internal magic, so this solution maintains his life force and physical form. He prefers to soak in it, although he can drink it and receive the same amount of energy. You can fill a bath with it, or a—large sink, or I could go and purchase a small pool for you.”

“I think I may actually have a water trough fit for just that thing, though I’ll have to check with the stables.”

Gaster blanches, as well as a skeleton with no cardiovascular system can blanch. “Um. Yes. Well, just be sure that it’s properly sterilized—he hasn’t been exposed to many germs throughout his life, so his immune system is—well, it’s not in top form. I wanted to let him grow a bit more before I started introducing him to the outside environment, but—”

“Wingdings, I’m sure he’ll be fine. Asriel was eating dirt by the time he was one.”

Gaster wants to cry.

“In—in any case, I’ve brought along some disinfectant with me,” Gaster says, lining up the spray bottles next to the fridge. “It’s simply diluted bleach. Avoid getting it on fabric, but it should sanitize everything else very well. You don’t have to spray— _everything,_ just things that are particularly dirty or dangerous, like the bathroom or dishes or anything that touches him regularly, like, um, your hands. Of course, I also brought some hand sanitizer for that purpose, so I’ll just set it right over here where you can see it—”

“Wingdings.” Asgore sounds amused. “It’s alright. He’s not a science experiment anymore, you remember? He’s a child, and I try not to raise children in a sanitized bubble.”

“Of—of course not.” Gaster exhales, rubbing his forehead. “I just—he really isn’t used to all of the germs floating around. I don’t want him to fall ill.”

“All children get sick at some point.”

“Yes, but—I don’t know how he’ll react to it. I don’t know if he’ll—” Gaster’s mouth twists. “If he’ll live.”

“Well, if he does fall ill, you’ll be the second person I call.”

“The second?”

“Why, yes—the first will be Dr. Yeoman. You know her?”

Gaster’s eyes brighten. “Oh, yes! She’s a pediatric specialist, isn’t she? Very respected in her field. I would appreciate if you would let her know as soon as anything seems— _off,_ with him. If anyone can fix him, it would be her. Of course, I’ll also come right away.”

“Of course.”

“I also brought a vitals’ system—” He removes it from his interdimensional box, setting it next to the fireplace. As he does, he sees the tip of 01’s muzzle poke out from the carrier, sniffing warily. “I can teach you how to connect it once he’s more comfortable. It measures his magical pulse, his oxygen and DT/M50 saturation—which should always be near 100—and his temperature. Now, you don’t have to have it on him _all_ the time—that’s hardly possible, now that he moves so much—but just a quick check every day would be nice. It could help us spot any potential problems early on.”

“Windings…” Asgore hesitates.

“What? What’s wrong?”

“That just seems like something you’d do to an experiment, not a—a child. I know you worry about him, but I don’t think taking his vitals _every day_ is quite necessary. Perhaps we could limit it to once a week?”

Gaster squirms uncomfortably. “...twice a week?”

“Very well. Twice a week.”

01 sets a paw outside of the carrier. Gaster watches very intently from the corner of his eye. “As for his training, I’ve written down a list of commands that he knows, and that you may find useful. I understand if you don’t want to issue them as—as _commands,_ anymore, but simply requests that a child might follow. Nevertheless, they’re words that he understands and responds to, should you find that useful. Er, what else, what else?” Gaster clicks his teeth nervously. “You’ll be responsible for teaching him ethical behavior. There’s not much advice I can offer about that, I’m afraid. Just—don’t allow him to bite or scratch, if you would. It’s harmless now, but once he’s larger—”

“I understand. What’s his daily routine?”

“It’s fairly simple—here, I’ll write it out for you. He receives breakfast at 8:00, and he’s always fed outside of the solution pool. I’ll usually play with him for a little while, with a tug rope or a ball, just to exercise him. He gets fed again at 11:00, then left to nap until he’s fed once more at 2:00. We’ll do some training after that, and he’ll nap again. He naps quite a bit. Er—sometimes he likes it if I read to him from my notes as he’s falling asleep. Or he likes listening to jazz. He eats again at 5:00, and then usually plays some more, and he eats for the last time at 8:00, then gets a quick wipe-down with a washcloth before he goes to bed.”

Asgore nods along, stroking his claws through his beard. “Did you bring any of his toys along?”

Gaster swears.

“I’ll take that as a no,” Asgore says, smiling. “Well, that’s alright. You can bring them by some other time. I’m sure I have a few children’s toys lying around somewhere.”

“I will warn you, he does tend to be quite—rough, when he plays. He’s got very strong jaws, and he might accidentally destroy toys that aren’t sturdy enough. I’ll try to bring his own toys over as soon as I can. Erm—he doesn’t wear clothes, although perhaps we should get him started on that. I’ll have to see if I can’t find a tailor to design something for him.”

“Oh, there’s a lovely one I know over in Hotland—their name is Thresh.”

“Thresh?” Gaster jots the name down on a notepad. “I’ll see if I can’t speak with them soon. I—” 01, who had been slowly making his way towards them, chooses that moment to sit down on Gaster’s foot. “Hello, 01.”

“Lo,” 01 says, distinctly miserable. Gaster feels like a piece of shit.

“I suppose there’s no reason not to name him now,” Asgore says cheerfully. “Were you thinking of names already? You can’t call him 01 for the rest of his life, you know.”

“I know.”

“If you’re looking for suggestions, I honestly do think Sam or Buddy would be cute.”

The king is—still not good at naming things. “I—skeletons typically name their children after the fonts they speak in,” Gaster explains. “Or. They used to, anyhow.”

“Ah. That explains your own name.”

Gaster inclines his head.

“So what font does this little guy speak in?” Asgore asks, crouching and waving at 01. 01 leans slightly in his direction, and Asgore allows him to sniff his fingers. “I’m afraid I can’t see his words when he speaks.”

“Few people can. It’s a—skeleton thing. His primary font is Wingdings, right now, but there’s another font beneath it. Comics Sans, I believe.”

“So you’ll call him Comic Sans?”

“It’s—a bit of a mouthful.”

“Sans, then.”

“Sans.” Gaster rolls the word around in his head. 01 glances expectantly at him. “Yes. Sans. That will do.”

“Sans.” Asgore smiles, and 01— _Sans_ allows the king to pet a paw across his skull. “Hello, Sans. Are you feeling better now? I know this is a big scary place, but I promise I’ll do my best to make it feel like home while you’re here.”

“And we both appreciate it very much,” Gaster says. “Now, then. I’ll just give him a quick wipe-down and be on my way; I’ll call in the morning to check up on him.”

Asgore graciously offers Gaster a warm washcloth, and Gaster takes a seat on the couch. He picks Sans up, setting him down on his lap and carefully running the washcloth across his bones. Sans slumps against him, quiet and still, watching the area around him cautiously. He turns his muzzle into Gaster’s neck, snuffling wearily, and Gaster smooths a hand down his spine.

“It’s okay,” he says as reasonably as he can, running the washcloth between Sans’ ribs. “You’ll be okay here. I wouldn’t take you anywhere I thought you would be hurt. You know that. I have to leave for a little while, but I promise I’ll call and visit, so you needn’t be worried. Besides, this place is much better for you then the lab. Asgore is very kind.”

Once Sans is clean, Gaster sets the washcloth aside and scoops him up. Sans hooks his front paws over Gaster’s shoulders, burrowing closer to him. Asgore watches with a fond gleam in his eye, and Gaster clears his (non-existent) throat pointedly. 

“Where would you like him to sleep?” he asks.

“Right this way.” Asgore leads him to a small, dusty bedroom with two beds. His children’s bedroom, no doubt, long abandoned. “I’ll let you put him to sleep—and then perhaps you can help me set up the solution before you go?”

“Certainly,” Gaster says, gently laying Sans on the bed. Sans immediately stands on the mattress, pacing in a quick circle before settling himself down again, propping his head in Gaster’s lap. Gaster smooths a hand over his skull, sighing softly. “Right. How about a quick chapter of _The Principles of Quantum Mechanics: Third Edition?”_

By the time the chapter is finished, Sans is snoozing, and Gaster is able to slide the child’s head off of his lap and onto the pillow. It’s the first time he’s slept on a bed, Gaster realizes, with another prickle of guilt. What a shitty eighteen months Sans has had. He can only hope that the rest of his life will make up for it. 

He stands up quietly, making his way out into the living room. Together, he and Asgore make the trip down to the stables to collect a small water trough. Gaster scrubs it thoroughly, spraying it down with sanitizer as Asgore constructs a little ramp to help Sans in and out of it. “He prefers it warm, and since it doesn’t have filtering, you’ll need to refill it a couple of times every day,” Gaster says, setting a gallon of solution next to the trough. “He’ll need a dose first thing in the morning, if not before then. He usually sleeps in it.”

“I’ll be sure he gets some as soon as he wakes up,” Asgore says, guiding him towards the door. The two of them pause in the doorway, gazing out at the city as it begins to slumber. “What of the project, Wingdings? Can you continue it? Is there any way to make these creatures non-sentient?”

Gaster hesitates. “I—don’t know. I can make them less intelligent, though of course that won’t make them less sentient, nor would it make them any less ethical to treat as weapons. Moreover, they would be harder to train, so I’m not certain that’s the way to go. I can limit their sense of pain, although that might prove to be their downfall in a battle, since they would be unaware of their injuries. I can try dulling their emotions and wants, but—” He shakes his head. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m willing to do. If I create many more that prove to be sentient, we’ll have a problem, unless we—unless we can euthanize them before they become dangerous, and I—I don’t—I can’t—”

“I won’t ask it of you. You have my permission to end the project at once.”

Relief sloshes down his spine. Gaster glances over. “But that means that if a human comes—”

“I will deal with it myself, as I have before.”

“I’m—I’m sorry. I wish you didn’t have to. I wish I could have helped more. I don’t want monsters to die because of my failure.”

“Failure? Wingdings, this isn’t failure. You discovered something that didn’t work, and that’s okay. You’re a scientist—you ought to know that. What’s more, you stopped before you did something truly immoral. That’s a success if I’ve ever seen one.” Asgore sets a paw on his shoulder. “I appreciate that you tried. I know you put a lot of hard work into this project, although I’m certain there were other projects that interested you more. But if killing humans is my burden to bear, then so be it. I would rather that then put an innocent child through torment merely to ease my own conscience.”

“I’ll figure something out,” Gaster says, setting his jaw. “I will. Just—not this.”

“Just not this,” Asgore agrees. “Go home, Wingdings. Get some rest. Maybe tomorrow you can work on the Core, right? That’s your favorite.”

A smile flickers across his face. “Yes. Of course. I’ve missed it.”

“I know you have. Goodnight, my boy.”

“Goodnight, Asgore.”

Gaster heads for his apartment, but not before making one last stop at the lab. While he’s there, he gathers up all the papers regarding Project Blaster and shoves them into a folder. Across the front of that folder he stamps a single, bold red word:

CANCELLED.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: the headcanon for this fic is that skeletons can physically see spoken words in a font. each skeleton has their own unique font, and all non-skeletons have the same basic undertale font. to other monsters, skeleton fonts can only be heard, not seen, and they're heard as accents. most of the accents are subtle enough that they're easily understandable, but some (i.e. wingdings) are strong enough that they make words unintelligible to regular monsters. so, while all the skeletons in this fic technically speak Common, they have accents to reflect their font. dr. gaster has to use sign language to translate his words, because his accent utterly destroys Common.


	3. i'm going to try my best

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: brief mentions of child abandonment, mentions of death/violence, brief self-mutilation, surgery, questionable surgical practices
> 
> “The answer can't be found in books - or be solved by bringing it to other people. Not unless you want to remain a child all your life. You've got to find the answer inside you—feel the right thing to do. Charlie, you've got to learn to trust yourself.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

As promised, Gaster videocalls Asgore first thing in the morning to check on Sans. The king looks haggard—his fur is uncombed and there are bags under his eyes. Gaster winces. “Good morning, Your Majesty,” he says, signing along with his words. “How, ah—how are things?”

“Wingdings,” Asgore says, his voice rough. “Did you know that Sans howls?”

“I didn’t, as a matter of fact.”

“Well. He’s developed a new talent, then. He can howl. For hours. Hours, Wingdings. Incessantly. Without end. Nothing I did made him stop. He wouldn’t eat, he wouldn’t sleep, he wouldn’t play. He only stayed in the solution because he was too weak to get out, by the time I got him in it.”

Gaster cringes with each and every statement. “Oh, dear. It sounds like he’s having trouble adjusting.”

Asgore’s eye twitches. “Yes. Yes, it does.”

“How is he now?”

“Still in the solution. Sleeping, I hope, though we’ll see how long that lasts.” He scrubs his face with his paws. “I’ll try to get him to settle down with some breakfast once he wakes.”

“The beef meal is his favorite. It reminds him of hamburger.”

“Noted. I’m also going to toss in some toast and see if he’ll have that. It should be easy enough for him to digest.”

Gaster nods. It’s a good first choice, as far as monster foods go. “Hopefully he’ll settle in more today. I’ll bring his toys by on my lunch break.”

“Oh, good. I don’t want to take him outside until he’s, er, calmer, but it will be good for him to have something to do inside. Have you spoken to Thresh?”

“Not yet. I’ll stop by this afternoon and see what they can do for us.”

Asgore nods, then sighs. “Well, I’d best get some work done before the little scamp wakes up.”

“Of course. Could I just—” Gaster hesitates. “Could I see him for a moment?”

Asgore carries the phone into the living room, angling it so Gaster can see Sans snoozing in the trough of solution. He’s got his head entirely buried under the liquid, and tiny bubbles pop at the surface from his snores. His tail is still tucked insecurely between his legs, and he’s curled into a tight ball. Gaster’s soul hurts. 

“Ah. Poor thing,” he says. “I hope he adjusts quickly. This is what I get for raising him in relative isolation.” He rubs his temples. “I’m sorry, Asgore.”

“Quite alright, fellow. We’ll get through it, don’t you worry.”

Gaster says his goodbyes to Asgore, then pulls out his phonebook to find the number for a Thresh in Hotland. He finds it quickly, calls to schedule an appointment, and then gathers up Sans’ toys for the trip over to the king’s house. He works for a while on the schematics of a Core circuit repair, but his thoughts are continually dragged down by concern for Sans. What is he going to do with that child? Who’s going to raise him? Will he grow into a normal monster, or—

Or something worse?

Shortly before his lunch break, someone knocks on his office door. He jumps, rather startled—few people visit his office without prior invitation. When he swings the door open, Jackson stands in front of him, shuffling his feet nervously. “Hi—Dr. Gaster? Can I talk to you for a moment?”

“Oh—certainly,” Gaster says, baffled. He steps aside, allowing Jackson to step into his office. “What can I do for you?”

“It’s about the blaster project. You—you cancelled it, sir?”

“Ah. Yes.” Gaster takes a seat behind his desk, and Jackson drops into one of the armchairs in front of it—the one with white hairs shed all over it. “I apologize for the short notice, but I spoke with the king yesterday, and we came to a mutual decision to cancel the project. It was unethical, you understand. 01 is sentient and sapient; he possesses the intelligence of a growing infant. I presume that as he continues to mature, it will become obvious that he’s a monster child, rather than anything that could be used as a weapon.”

“Of course, sir, and I understand that. 01 shouldn’t be used for the project if you believe he’s sapient. But isn’t there—couldn’t there be some way to create a blaster that _isn’t_ sapient? There must be. You create blasters like that with your magic.”

“I do, but in severing the link between my magic and theirs, we imbue them with independence and, evidently, sentience and sapience. Perhaps the project could be continued in the future, but not until I discover some way to ascertain that any future beasts would be created as fully non-sapient entities. I don’t have the knowledge or resources to do that, as of right now, so the project is cancelled indefinitely.”

“But—it _could_ continue, if we discovered a way to create non-sapient blasters?”

“Well, theoretically, yes, but you shouldn’t waste your time on that. I’ll be looking into it, but I don’t expect anything to come of it within the next few decades, at the very least. I’d like you transferred onto the Core project, for right now. How would you like that?”

“I—really, sir?” Jackson asks, his eyes widening. “The Core?” 

“Certainly. You’ve proven yourself to be ambitious and trustworthy with Sans—ah, with 01. I would like your assistance on the Core as well. Do I have it?”

“Absolutely, sir. But, can I ask, what—what happened to 01? Was he—destroyed?”

Gaster shakes his head. “No. I’ve taken him to someone who can care for him as a child deserves to be cared for. Rest assured, he’ll be safe.”

Jackson hesitates, then nods and rises from his seat. “Alright. Thank you, Dr. Gaster. What—what would you have done differently? If you were going to make another blaster?”

Gaster steeples his hands in front of him, studying the joints of his knuckles. “Less intelligence. No emotion, sapience, or wants, save the desire to serve monsterkind and capture humans. A quicker growth rate. That’s what I wanted.” He takes a deep breath. “But it’s alright. At least we know what not to do, hm? That’s part of science, too. The biggest part, in all honesty.”

“Yes,” Jackson says, his gaze flickering away. “Definitely. Thanks for your time, doc.”

“It’s no problem. Have a nice day, Jackson. If you have time, we’ll be having a meeting about the Core’s progress this evening. I’ll email you the details.”

After Jackson leaves, Gaster waits impatiently until his lunch break rolls around, then rushes from the lab. He stops by Hotland, first, to discuss Sans’ wardrobe with Thresh. The tailor’s shop is a quaint little building near Alphys’ lab, and Thresh themself is a tiny, scaly creature with flinty eyes. They look over the dimensions and pictures of Sans that Gaster supplies, humming thoughtfully.

“...yes,” they decide, after a moment. “Yes, yes, yes, I can do something here. What you thinking? You thinking warm attire? Cold? You got a color preference?”

“Oh, um—both warm and cold, please. T-shirts and sweaters, shorts and jeans, and at least one jacket and one coat. Some shoes, if you could. As for colors—” Gaster clicks his teeth. Monochromes might make seem Sans seem more threatening. “—something calm, but still colorful. Stripes.”

“You got it, milquetoast,” Thresh says, scribbling everything down with their tail. Milquetoast…feels like an insult, but it’s spoken jovially. “So, what? This your kid or somethin’? You got some weird genes.”

Gaster huffs out an almost-laugh. “Tell me about it.”

“Well, I call you when drafts are done, get your opinion before I make ‘em. Should be done in—eh, couple weeks. Deal?”

“Deal. Thank you very much, Thresh.”

“No problemo, milquetoast.”

~~Milquetoast~~ Gaster makes his way from Thresh’s shop to Asgore’s house in good time. As soon as he’s within earshot, though, he winces, because—yep. Yep, that’s the king’s house, howling loudly enough for most of the street to hear. He shuffles up to the front door and knocks. Asgore yanks the door open, eyes wide and frazzled. 

“Wingdings. Oh, thank god, Wingdings. Please make him stop.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Gaster steps into the house, setting his carrier bag down next to the door. “Sans?” he calls, and the howling cuts off sharply. He hears the skitter of claws across the floor, and the child whips around the corner and into the kitchen with an ungodly shriek. He plunges into Gaster’s legs, winding frantically around his ankles and complaining very loudly in puppy noises. Gaster wheezes out a breath when he realizes he’s not being attacked, reaching down to scoop Sans up.

“Hello there, you scoundrel,” he says. Sans arow-ow-ows pitifully at him, turning his head so fast his muzzle _cracks_ right against Gaster’s jaw. Arow- _ow-ow-ow_ indeed. “I hear you’ve been giving Asgore a hard time, mister. Did you eat your breakfast, at least?” He peers over Sans’ head to look hopefully at Asgore.

“Well,” Asgore says, sighing and wilting into his armchair. “He ate some of it. He wasn’t interested in the toast at all, and he only got half the meal down.”

“Is that right?” Gaster takes a seat on the couch, letting Sans sit in his lap, although the child seems determined to climb all over him. “That’s not like you at all. How come you’re not eating, then, Sans? I know it’s a big scary place, but you’ve got to keep your strength up. Did you give him the beef?”

“I did.”

“Sans, you love the beef. You shouldn’t waste it.”

“Tit,” Sans says, clearly annoyed. Gaster chokes.

Asgore snorts, then asks, “Did you remember to bring his toys?” 

“Ah, I did. They’re in the bag,” Gaster says, waving a hand at the door. “I also spoke with Thresh, and they’ll be done designing the clothes in a couple of weeks. Once they get my approval, they’ll start making them, so hopefully they’ll be done within the month.”

Asgore arches an eyebrow. “He’ll have grown out of them by the time they get here.”

“I specifically requested that they were adjustable.”

“A wise choice.”

“I make those, on rare occasions.”

“I should hope so. Any luck finding someone to take this little guy?” Asgore asks, gesturing at Sans, who has curled up in Gaster’s lap to grumble-growl under his breath. 

“Not yet. I’m going to look into it some more once I get back to the lab. He seems alright now, though, doesn’t he?”

Asgore gives him A Look. “He’s alright because _you’re_ here. He missed you.”

“Oh, come on, that’s hardly it. He misses the lab, his home, his routines. If he misses me, it’s only because I’m familiar to him.”

Asgore’s Look turns into a glare. “He _misses_ you, Wingdings.”

“He has no soul,” Gaster reminds him. “He forms no attachments. If he likes me, he likes me because I provide food and entertainment. He doesn’t like me because I’m _me._ He will never like anyone because of who they are, only because of what they bring him. Such is his nature.” He sighs, running a hand down Sans’ back. “Poor bastard.”

“Can’t you make him a soul?”

Gaster stares at the king. 

“Alright, alright. Stupid question, I suppose. But isn’t there anything you can give him to let him feel love? It’s going to be a sad life, if he can’t ever feel that.”

“I’ll look into it, but I have a sinking feeling I won’t find anything. If one could design a soul substitute, wouldn’t it have already been done?”

Asgore shrugs. “Can’t hurt to try.”

Gaster stands, gathering the toys from his bag and setting them on the end of the couch. Sans growls when he moves, tail flicking irritably, but doesn’t snap. “Well, as much as I’d love to stay and chat, I do have work to do. Royal Scientist and all, you know.”

“Oh, I know.” Asgore scowls. “He’s going to start right back up when you leave.”

“Nonsense. Just keep him distracted.”

“Why can’t you take him? You’re his biological father, anyway. Actually, you’re his biological clone, isn’t that right?” 

Gaster laughs. “Don’t be silly, Asgore. Genetics alone don’t make family. Besides, I practically live in the lab—which is exactly what we _don’t_ want for him. What’s more, I’m not as strong as you are, should he decide to attack me, and I’m not exactly parent material. He’ll be much better off with someone else.”

Asgore’s brow furrows in thought. “Hm. Perhaps. But I still think—”

“No. I can’t do it. I would ruin him.”

“Wingdings—”

Gaster shakes his head fervently. “I’m sorry, Asgore, but no. I don’t want him. I’ll find someone who does.”

But as he leaves, he hears Sans begin to howl again, and he—

Wonders.

_Could_ he raise Sans himself? No. No, of course not, that would be—stupid, and impossible, and stupid. He spends his life in the lab, and Sans needs to grow up in the outside world. He’d need to take a shit-ton of time off of work in order to even _begin_ to give Sans the attention and work he needs. Of course, it’s likely that Asgore would be willing to give him leave—paid leave, more than likely—as long as he liked, but Gaster can’t imagine abandoning his projects, his lab, his _home_ for so long. He loves that lab. And his projects—what would he do without them? They’re his _babies._

Sure, okay, maybe he could work from home most of the time, and visit the lab a few days a week for meetings or research. Asgore would be a willing babysitter on those days, or Alphys, even. And maybe—maybe Sans would like to visit the lab, once in a while, if only to see Lucky and Jackson. They spent almost as much time with him as Gaster did, albeit mostly when Sans was sleeping; however, that still doesn’t solve the problem of how dangerous Sans is. Gaster is no pushover when it comes to magic (he can create a fleet of upwards of fifty blasters at once, if he needs to), but his HP isn’t as high as he would like it to be. If Sans really wanted to hurt him, then it would be altogether too easy. And could Gaster stop him before he went that far? Would he be strong enough to do—to do what needed to be done, if Sans turned out...badly? 

Would he able to kill his own creation?

_No._

He knows it in his bones. He couldn’t do it. Not even if it was to save another life—to save multiple lives. He couldn’t hurt that child. Meanwhile, Asgore—Asgore could. He could kill Sans, if it was necessary for the good of his people. He’s killed children before, and he’ll do it again. The Underground is safer if Sans is with their king (is with the person who can murder him most easily).

What if—what if he _could_ design a soul substitute for Sans, though? What if he could give him love? What if Gaster could, to the best of his ability, eliminate the chance that Sans would ever turn out badly? He knows there’s never going to be a _completely_ good creature, no matter how much of a soul it has, but a creature that can feel love is bound to be safer and happier. Asgore is right. Sans needs a soul, especially if he’s going to go home with someone else. Someone like—like Gaster.

....this isn’t going to be difficult at all.

(Lies. Lies from Satan.)

Gaster spends the next few weeks raking over all the information about souls he can. In his free time, he works on the Core, and on finding Sans a back-up home if—if this falls through, which seems more and more likely, the more he researches. Everything he reads says that souls cannot be made artificially. It simply isn’t possible. They’re too complex, too unique and individualized. The only way they _can_ be made is when two or more monsters sap the magic from their own souls and use it to create a child’s soul. The stronger the child’s soul gets, the weaker the parents’ souls get. It’s—not ideal. There’s only one of him, after all. To give Sans a piece of his own soul would be to begin a slow, weary death. Gaster—

Gaster doesn’t want to die.

But to condemn a child to a life without feeling or giving love? To condemn a child _he_ created? He was aware of the risks. He should have had a back-up plan before he ever created another living creature. After all, there is no life made without sacrifice. 

...he should have been prepared for this.

That night, he goes home, locks himself the bathroom of his tiny apartment, sits in the bathtub, and has a meltdown. He doesn’t want to die he doesn’t want to die he _doesn’t want to die,_ he’s not a father, he’s not _ready_ to be a father and he’s never going to be, so _why did he ever think this was a good idea?!_ Why the _fuck_ did he ever do this to a child? Sans should never have been created, but the fact is that he _was,_ and now Gaster has to take responsibility for it. He can’t just walk out on this (not like his own father did, _not like his father—)._ He can’t shove all of his mistakes onto someone else, even as fiercely as he’s been trying to. Sans is his creation. Sans is his—

Sans is his son, whether he wanted one or not.

He takes a deep, shuddering breath and presses the heels of his hands into his eyesockets. Sans is his son. He can’t take credit for a creation and refuse to make the sacrifices necessary to keep it. The only easy way out would be to euthanize Sans—and that’s something he’s already decided he absolutely can’t do. Besides, maybe it’s—not so bad, this death thing. Toriel and Asgore seemed ready to accept it for Asriel, so why shouldn’t Gaster be able to accept it for Sans? Maybe Sans will grow up to be great, maybe he’ll grow up to carry on Gaster’s legacy. Isn’t that immortality itself, in a way? Besides, even if he gives Sans a piece of his soul, he’ll have a few years left. At least sixty—maybe more, if he’s lucky and Sans isn’t a voracious magic-consumer. 

Once he’s made his decision, there’s no going back. He’s never been one to change his mind easily. But there is a problem—ordinarily, children are born with souls, and the soul grows with the body. No one has ever waited until a child was nineteen months old to attempt to cram a soul inside of it; nor has anyone ever tried to do it _alone._ He knows how soul-breaking and magic merging occurs between multiple monsters, but he’s not quite sure how to do it by himself. Nor can he simply rip off a piece of his soul; it’s too deeply entwined with his body. It would be like a cutting a piece of bone off.

...so that’s what he decides to do.

If he takes a piece of his body, he takes a piece of his soul. He’ll take bone from somewhere it isn’t strictly necessary; his sternum, perhaps, or his metacarpals. If he can integrate that bone somewhere into Sans’ body, it should also, in theory, integrate the soulshard. A soul transplant, if you will. After that, he hopes the transplanted soulshard will continue to feed off of the larger part of the soul, but—well, he can’t confirm it until after the procedure is done. He’s not willing to do test runs. He only has so much soul to give.

With a piece of his soul missing, he’ll be almost immediately weaker—magically speaking, anyhow. He’ll still feel love and kindness as strongly as ever (one only needs a little bit of a soul, to feel those things), but his magical prowess will be dampened. As Sans’ soul grows, and Gaster’s shrinks, Gaster will lose more and more of his magic.

So he’ll start off small. Very small. 

Almost a month and a half after leaving Sans with Asgore, Gaster comes to take Sans away again. Asgore welcomes him warmly, and Sans rushes to greet him, yapping and dancing around his feet. He’s settled in some, since he first arrived, although he still (according to Asgore) howls for hours after Gaster leaves. But he’s eating more and more monster food—cereal and fried eggs, hamburgers and salads, jams and pies. He’s even gone outside, a few times, to the garden. Asgore says he loves playing among the flowers and basking in the glimpses of sunlight they get, living this close to the surface.

“So what are you going to do with him?” Asgore asks, as they both watch Sans chase a squeaky ball across the floor. “I thought you didn’t want to take him back to the lab.”

“I don’t, but—there’s something I need to do for him.”

Asgore looks hopefully at him. “...a soul?”

Gaster dips his chin in a brief nod.

“Oh, Wingdings!” Asgore hugs him tightly, spinning him around. Gaster swears he hears his spine crack in several places. “I knew you’d figure something out! You’re so smart, you little rascal, you. What is it? A substitute of some sort? How’d you do it?”

“I haven’t done anything yet,” Gaster says, straightening his jacket once Asgore sets him back on his feet. “I don’t know if it will even work. It’s just a theory.”

Asgore frowns. “Will it hurt him, if it doesn’t work?”

“It shouldn’t.”

“Good.” Asgore beams, clearly relieved. “And if it does work?”

“And if it does work, I—think I may have found someone willing to take him off your hands.”

Asgore practically squeals in excitement. “Oh my goodness, really? Who?”

“Ah, you’ll see.”

“Do I know them?”

“You know everyone, Your Majesty.”

“Oh, right. I forgot.”

Loading Sans into the carrier is a bit of a hassle. He’s clever enough to recall that he hated his last carrier ride, so he stays away from them once the carrier is brought out, growling unhappily whenever they step closer. He eyes the hamburger Gaster throws into the carrier with interest, but refuses to go in after it. 

“Come on, please?” Gaster tries. He’s already having an incredibly stressful day. Getting ready to lose a piece of one’s soul does that to a guy. “Just for a little bit?”

Sans balks. 

“Alright.” Gaster sighs, picking up the carrier and heading pointedly for the door. “I suppose I’ll just leave on my own, then.”

Sans takes a step in his direction, whining. 

“Oh? Do you want to come with me?” Gaster arches his bonebrow. “You may, if you get inside of the carrier.”

“Er,” Sans says, rocking uncertainly on his paws. 

“Come now, it’s honestly not that bad.” He sets the carrier down in the doorway, stepping outside and opening the carrier’s door. He pats his hands on the side. “Hop in, Sans. Let’s go outside.”

“Errrr.”

“Asgore, would you hand me that toy, please? Thank you.” Gaster squeaks one of Sans’ favorite toys—a little rubber ball colored like a hamburger—then tosses it into the carrier. Sans stumbles a few steps closer, leaning forward and sniffing earnestly. “That’s it, atta boy. It’ll only be for a few minutes.”

Sans slinks uncertainly into the carrier, yelping and spinning around when Gaster clicks the door shut behind him. Gaster soothes him a moment longer, waiting until he falls quiet and then picking up the carrier. Sans doesn’t growl, this time, and Gaster breathes a sigh of relief. The walk to the lab is a mercifully quick one, although Gaster takes care to avoid other monsters as he slinks down to the operating room. He doesn’t exactly want this procedure to be common knowledge.

Once he’s set up his equipment, he releases Sans from the carrier and lets him trot around the room, sniffing curiously. He takes a seat, sitting cross-legged in the middle of the floor. “I’m going to give you a soul today,” he tells the child. “I’m afraid it isn’t much of one, but it’s all I have. I hope it will do you some good. It should at least allow you to feel love—life isn’t much without love, you know. And—and I created you, so it’s my responsibility to give you love, and I will. I’m going to try to be your father, Sans. I hope that’s alright.”

Sans stands up on his hind paws, sniffing at the centrifuge on the counter.

“I’m going to do my best to be a good one, but—I have to admit, I haven’t a lot of experience. I didn’t have a father of my own to teach me anything, but I’ve watched Asgore, and I’ve learned some from him. If I ever need help, he’ll be the first one I ask. And if I ever feel like I can’t take care of you properly, I’ll get you to someone who will. I’m going to try my best for you, though, so I hope we can make this work. I want us to be a family.”

Sans springs up onto the counter, nosing amidst the scales and graduated cylinders. 

“I made you. That was a mistake, but it’s over, and it’s done, and I’m going to take responsibility for it. I won’t abandon you. _You’re_ not a mistake, Sans. Maybe it was a mistake that made you, but _you_ are not the mistake. I hope you understand that, when you’re older.”

“Er,” Sans repeats joyfully, springing down from the counter and trotting towards the surgery table, instead. 

“The procedure is—simple, in theory. I’m going to put you under general anesthesia, so you won’t feel anything. I’m going to cut out a piece of my bone and place it inside of your sternum. You might be a little sore tomorrow, but that’s all. The soul should follow the bone, and in a few days you should have a steady supply of internal magic. You won’t need the DT/M50 anymore. Won’t that be nice?”

Gaster gets to his feet, scooping Sans up and setting him on the table. The child widens his stance to keep his balance on the slick surface, body held low. “Easy, now,” Gaster murmurs, reaching for the muzzle mask. “I won’t let you fall. You’re just going to sleep for a while. Here we are—” He fits the mask over Sans’ muzzle, buckling the straps behind his head. Sans whines, trying to duck his head to paw the mask off, but Gaster holds his chin up. “Shhh. It’s alright. Just relax.”

Sans eyes him uncertainly, tail tucking between his legs. “‘aster.”

“Yes. I’m here, little one. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

“‘aster.”

“Sans.”

“‘aster.”

Gaster leans his head against Sans’ skull as the child slides down to lay on the table. “You’ll be alright. We’ll both be alright. I promise.”

The child’s eyes start to droop, his eyelights flickering. Gaster settles his head on the table, hushing him softly as he drifts into sleep. He waits a few moments longer, stroking Sans’ skull, until he’s sure that the child is truly unconscious. He doesn’t want him to feel this pain. He doesn’t want him to feel any pain, not ever. He doesn’t deserve it. 

Gaster steps back from the table, sliding a needle into the three centermost metacarpals of his right hand. He forces an amount of lidocaine into each one, sucking breath through his teeth at the sting. Easier this sting than the one that comes next, though. Far, far easier. As he waits for the center of his hand to numb, he reaches for the marker next to the surgical table and traces out a perfect circle on Sans’ manubrium, the topmost part of his sternum. Then he gently rolls the child onto his back and straps his front limbs to the table on either side of his body, so Gaster has clear access to his chest. He disinfects Sans’ bone with a smear of iodopovidone, then does the same for his hand.

After that, he reaches for the bonesaw.

It’s over within moments. A perfect circle of bone falls from Sans’ manubrium, and Gaster sets it carefully aside. No blood, no pain, no fuss. Just a little trickle of white magic oozing from the cut bone, attempting valiantly to heal itself. Gaster doesn’t want to wait for the cut to clot with magic, so he quickly moves over to the laser cutter and sets his own hand down in the center. Presses START before he has time to think about it.

A gleam of red light sears through his palm, cutting out another perfect circle. The lidocaine works miracles, and Gaster hardly feels a thing—just the faintest sharp tug in his soul as a part of it is pulled away, his HP dropping accordingly. After that, he moves quickly, setting the pieces of his metacarpals into the hole in Sans’ sternum. There’s a thin gap between each metacarpal and the next, but not enough to compromise the integrity of the sternum. Gaster is satisfied with the placement. He glues them into position, then wipes the whole area down with ethanol and wraps it snugly in a bandage. He does the same for the empty hole in his hand, then pops a pair of pain pills before the lidocaine wears off. 

“There,” he murmurs, stroking his good hand over Sans’ skull. “All done. Easy, right?”

He slips the anesthesia mask off of Sans’ muzzle, unties the restraints, and reverses the sedation with a quick shot to Sans’ scapula. He wraps the little blaster’s body in a warm blanket, then tucks him back into the carrier. After a moment’s consideration, he sets the circle of Sans’ manubrium into a beaker of preservative and hides it on a high shelf. You know. Just in case. After that, they head back to Asgore’s house. Gaster definitely doesn’t think about the fact that he just gave up his immortality. He doesn’t. He _doesn’t._

Asgore greets them warmly when they return. “A-ha, the boys are back! How did everything go?”

“It went well,” Gaster says, setting the carrier down and gently easing Sans’ body out. He’s still asleep, but he stirs briefly as he’s moved, his mouth opening and closing wearily. “He’s still a bit groggy, and he may be a little nauseous tonight, but he should be feeling better by tomorrow.”

“What did you do?” Asgore asks, peering curiously at the sleeping child as Gaster sits down with him.

“Mm.” Gaster closes his eyes. “What every parent must.”

He hears Asgore go very, very still. “...parent?”

“Yes. He’s my son, Asgore, is he not? You said as much yourself. I created him. He’s my responsibility, and I won’t shirk that any longer. I gave him a piece of my soul.”

“You what.”

Gaster glances up, and Asgore’s expression is completely blank. He holds up his bandaged hand. “I hypothesized that by taking a piece of my body, I would take a piece of my soul, since the body is merely a reflection of soulmagic. I took a few pieces of my metacarpals and transplanted them into his manubrium. There will be no lasting physical damage for either of us, and I felt the risk was worth the reward. I’m hoping that my soul will have been transplanted along with my bones, but—I suppose only time will tell.”

Asgore rests his face in his paws. “Oh, Wingdings.”

“I thought you would be pleased.”

“I—I’m happy that you’ve decided to take him, but—I don’t want you to do that just because you feel like you’re _supposed_ to. He deserves some who wants him for who he is, does he not?”

“But I do want him!” Gaster says, leaning forward urgently. Sans whines softly in his lap, and he sits back. “I do. I know I said I didn’t, but I thought about it, and—I do. I miss him, too, when I’m gone. I miss reading to him, and teaching him things, and playing games with him, and—I miss _him,_ Asgore. I want him.”

“Well, I suppose there’s no going back now, since you’ve already mutilated the both of you,” Asgore says, rather grimly, and Gaster flinches back.

“You wanted me to take him. Why are you getting upset _now?”_

“I would have liked to _talk_ to you about it first. I just—feel as though maybe you’re doing this for the wrong reasons.”

Gaster hugs himself, humiliation seething between his ribs. “What? Because I feel responsible for something I created?”

“Just because you created something doesn’t necessarily mean you’re the—the best person to _raise_ that something. Do you know what I mean?”

Gaster hunches his shoulders.

“It’s—like with Chara. Toriel and I didn’t create them, but the people who _did_ create them were certainly not the ones who should have raised them. Wingdings, I—I think you have the potential to be an incredible father,” Asgore says, taking a seat beside him. “And Sans clearly enjoys being around you. You’ve basically been raising him already, and I would love to see you continue doing that.”

“Then why are you mad at me?” Gaster whispers.

“Oh, no, no, my boy. I’m not mad at you at all.” Asgore wraps an arm around him, squeezing him gently. “I’m just—a bit shocked. I would have preferred it if you had taken Sans _first,_ and spent some time with him, before you decided to—to perform a surgery and give up your immortality. It just feels a little rash. What if you find out the two of you are incompatible? What if you find out you don’t really want to be his father?”

“Then I’ll give him to someone who does, but giving him my soul, Asgore, that was—that _was_ my responsibility. I made him. I couldn’t let him go on without feeling love, not in good conscience. Whether I raise him or not, I wanted him to have a soul, and I was willing to give him one.” Gaster’s shoulders sag. “I thought I was doing the right thing.”

“Oh, dear.” Asgore rests his chin on Gaster’s skull. “I know you did. And if that’s the way you truly feel, then I’m proud of you. You did a very noble thing. Sans certainly deserved a soul. Was there...was there no other way?”

Gaster shakes his head.

“Mm. In that case, thank you, Wingdings. You were very brave, and I’m sure Sans will be very grateful once he’s older. Now, if you really want to be this boy’s father, I’m more than willing to help you out. What do we need to do first?”

Gaster glances up, a hopeful smile tugging at his mouth. “Really?”

“Of course.” Asgore pats his skull affectionately. “Is your house already child-proofed? Do you have a room ready for him?”

“Oh—oh, um, actually. About that. I was thinking that maybe my apartment is too small to raise a child, but there’s this little house in Snowdin that would be just perfect. It’s not too close to any major shops, so if anything _did_ happen, most people would be safe. It’s got a big back yard for him to run around in, and two bedrooms, and—”

“Say no more. The moving crew is on it, starting tomorrow. But for tonight, why don’t you sleep here? I’m sure Sans will be glad to have the company when he wakes up.”

“You think?”

“Of course I do. He’s going to love you, Papa Wingdings. You just wait.”

“Oh, god.”

“What?”

“Papa Wingdings. Oh, no.”

“Ha! You like that? I can think of some more.”

“Spare me, please.”

“Alright, alright. Get to bed, you two. I’ll see you in the morning. To Snowdin!”

“Heh. Yes. To Snowdin.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> heeeere's to chapter three! thank you guys so much for all of the comments and kudos and support so far!! it really means a lot!! if anybody ever wants to shout at me about anything (undertale related or nah), you can also do so over at my tumblr, [parsnipit](https://parsnipit.tumblr.com/)! it's mostly a hodgepodge of undertale reblogs and random life tidbits, rn. important info about update schedules or chapter previews might also start poppin up over there soon :D
> 
> edit 8/16: aaa i forgot a fun fact!!! okay okay here's one: gaster is a baaad judge of character, 'cause he tends to want to assume the best of everyone. (paps gets it from him.) sans is the black sheep of the family, in that regard; he's a natural Judge.


	4. soulshard

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: none for this chapter! :D
> 
> “Whatever happens to me, I will have lived a thousand normal lives by what I might add to others not yet born.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

“Yes, just along the wall there will be fine,” Gaster says, glancing over his shoulder as two of his generous new neighbors, Dogamy and Dogaressa, help move a crib into Sans’ new bedroom. Sans himself hides around Gaster’s ankles, though his curiosity seems to be piqued upon seeing other canine-shaped creatures. Gaster, meanwhile, slots children's books into a large blue bookshelf against the far wall of the room. 

“How’s that?” Dogamy asks once the crib is in place, setting his hands on his hips and puffing his chest out proudly.

“It’s perfect,” Gaster says. “Thank you both very much.”

“It’s no problem at all, lil skele,” Dogaressa says, her tail wagging. “Anything for our new neighbor. What else do you need brought up?”

“Er—” Gaster glances around the room, going through a mental checklist. The bed is in place, along with the dresser, the curtains, the rug, the toy box, the clothes (a few fresh from Thresh’s, even)—“Ah. The rocking chair, please.”

“You got it,” Dogamy says, and the two of them trot back down the stairs. Gaster finishes sliding the last few books into place, then stands, stretching himself out. His knees pop. What a day, what a day. 

“Alright, Sans,” he says, reaching down and scooping the child up. He glances between Sans’ ribs, as he’s done every-so-often since his attempted soul transfusion a few days ago, but sees no glimmer of a soulshard yet. “Let’s go see how Asgore’s getting along.”

He carries Sans over to the other bedroom, where Asgore is dutifully attempting to construct a pair of enormous bookcases. Sans gurgles quietly in curiosity.

“How’s it going?” Gaster asks, setting Sans down and kneeling beside Asgore. Sans immediately slinks off to hide beneath the bed, only the twitching tip of his tail visible. All of these new sights and sounds are overwhelming him, no doubt, and as grateful as Gaster is to their moving crew, he’s ready for them to be gone. 

“I’m suffering,” Asgore says, rolling back to sit on his haunches, his own stubby goat-tail flicking with irritation.

“Why don’t you go downstairs and take a break? There’s lemonade in the fridge. I can finish this.”

“Oh, are you sure? I’d almost finished it—I just can’t figure out where these next damned screws go.”

“I’m sure. You can help me put our clothes away in a few minutes.”

“Right. Will do.”

Gaster gets to work finishing the bookcases as Asgore heads downstairs. Once both the cases are finished, he begins slotting in his own books—a much more arduous process than organizing Sans’. As soon as he finishes, he scoops Sans up again, carrying him downstairs. He fetches them both a drink of lemonade, and coaxes Sans into drinking a bit of DT/M50 (since he doubts the soulshard is present or functioning yet). After that, he and Asgore begin organizing the clothing. Dogaressa and Dogamy set up the kitchen, and by the time the artificial lights outside begin to dim, everything is finally, _finally_ in place.

He’s home. _They’re_ home. 

He says his goodbyes to the Dogi, promising them a token of his gratitude at some point in the future, before shutting the door and sinking down to sit against it in relief. “Oh, my goodness,” he says. “I’m exhausted.” 

“That makes two of us, buddy,” Asgore says, flopping down on Gaster’s brand-new, plush green couch. 

Sans jumps up to sit beside him, resting his chin on Asgore’s knee. “Lo,” he sighs.

“Do you wanna just, like—” Gaster waves a hand uselessly in the air. “Order some pizza?”

“I want nothing more than that at this very moment.”

So Gaster orders pizza. The three of them sit on the couch and eat out of the box—Gaster allows Sans a single slice, although he doesn’t want to overwhelm him with grease. He supplements the rest of Sans’ dinner with a packet of chicken meal, which is readily scarfed down. After dinner, Asgore says his goodbyes—he hugs both Gaster and Sans (who squirms but allows it). Gaster is sad to see him go, and a touch nervous, to be quite honest. What if something goes wrong with Sans? What if Gaster doesn’t know what to do?

He keeps his phone well-charged, just in case.

After everyone is gone, Gaster takes a moment to simply explore. The living room is wide and spacious, with thin blue carpet. He’s set out a large, dark green rug for Sans to play on, and a small entertainment center and TV occupy the far wall. In the corner there’s a small end table; against the opposite wall is a much larger table he’s sure will be used for...something. Eventually. A coat rack stands near the door, occupied by Gaster’s black overcoat and Sans’ new yellow and blue coat. Two sets of snowboots stand near the coat rack’s base, one set in black and one in yellow, and two knit hats hang near the top, colored similarly to the boots. Gaster’s hat has a purple puff on the top. (It was a gift from Grillby.)

The kitchen is small, but functional, complete with a fridge, a microwave, an oven, a rather tall sink, and counter space. The floor is warm, checkered tile. Sans follows him in, sniffing curiously at the trash can, his claws clicking against the floor. “We’ll cook some breakfast tomorrow morning,” Gaster says. “Of course, I suppose we’ll have to go shopping after that, as we'll be out of food. That will be a fun socialization experience, won’t it?”

Sans attempts to climb into the trash can. Gaster rushes to prevent this.

The upstairs is next. Gaster took the room closest to the stairs—whatever comes through the front door, it’s going to have face _him_ before it gets to Sans. The far wall houses his bookshelves, while his bed sits along the wall closest to the door. In the corner is his desk, along with his office chair, computer, and filing cabinet. On the other side of the room is a longer desk, upon which he’s sure he’ll spend many hours drafting and correcting lab reports. The room farther down the hall will be Sans’, if Gaster can convince him to sleep there. All of the furniture there is painted light, calming blue or gentle, imperfect white. In the corner is a colorful foam playmat, with pieces in the shape of a jigsaw puzzle.

Between the two bedrooms sits the bathroom, which Gaster has livened up with green curtains, a green shower curtain, and a green rug. There’s a bathmat inside of the tub to keep Sans from slipping during bathtimes, and bottles of a gentle bone soap line the far edge of the tub. “How about a bath?” Gaster suggests as Sans drifts into the bathroom behind him, sniff-sniff-sniffing everywhere he can. “I know you’ve never had one before, but I promise they’re harmless. Here—”

He ushers Sans further into the bathroom, then shuts the door behind him and turns on the water. Sans jumps at the sudden noise, but quickly settles when he realizes Gaster isn’t frightened. Gaster taps the edge of the tub, and Sans braces his front paws against it, peering down into the water as it fills.

“See?” he says. “It’s just like the solution.”

Sans leans his muzzle down, sniffing the surface of the water before sneezing approvingly into it. As the child studies the filling bath, Gaster carefully unwinds the bandage wrapped around his sternum—and the bandage wrapped around his own hand. The hole glares back at him, stark and unsettling. He peeks again between Sans’ ribs for any flicker of light, any sign that the transfusion _might_ have worked.

There is nothing but darkness.

Gaster breathes in. Out. In. Out. Bone heals slowly. It’s fine. It’s—fine.

“Alright. Up we get.” He scoops Sans up, setting him in the water once the tub is halfway full. Sans leans forward, snapping his jaws lazily at the running water from the faucet. Gaster soaks a soft washcloth in the water, then lathers it with soap and begins running it across Sans’ bones. He takes special care to clean the wound in his sternum well, although Sans winces and tucks his tail as he does. Once Sans is wiped clean, Gaster rinses him off with the shower head. While he does, Sans turns a fascinated eye on the glossy bubbles that slide from his bones and into the water. 

“Those are called bubbles,” Gaster explains. “Soap molecules are amphipathic, similar to fat molecules. They have one hydrophobic end and one hydrophilic end—one end that likes water and the other that fears it. The water-loving ends turn towards the water, and the water-hating ends turn away from it, so you get a wall of soap with two layers and a little bit of water in between them. That’s the glossy part of the bubble. On the outside of each layer there’s air. Pretty neat, right?”

Sans tries to eat the bubbles.

Once Sans is clean and bubble-free, Gaster scoops him out and sets him on the rug. He gently towels him dry, although Sans wants nothing more than to squirm away and explore. Before Gaster releases him, he rinses Sans’ sternum with saline solution, then wraps it in a fresh bandage. As soon as he lets go, Sans skitters off to sniff behind the toilet, tail wagging slowly. 

Gaster seizes the opportunity to take a quick shower of his own, then wraps a towel snugly around his waist before heading for his bedroom. Sans, unwilling to be left behind for even a moment, trots after him and plunges under his bed once they reach the room, growling at dustbunnies. Gaster changes into his pajamas, then debates on attempting to get Sans to wear some—it couldn’t hurt to start him off now, could it? He’s been fed, he’s clean and, no doubt, he’ll be getting sleepy soon. Now seems like a good time to introduce the concept of actually wearing clothing. 

“Sans, heel—er, come along with me,” he calls, heading down the hall towards Sans’ bedroom. Sans pads after him, peering through the (baby-proofed, thank the stars) railing down at the first floor. “We’re going to try on some pajamas tonight. Something simple, I think—” He rifles through Sans’ dresser, pulling out a loose blue t-shirt with bright red rockets on it. “How about this?”

Sans leans forward, sniffing earnestly at the new material.

“You wear it like this,” Gaster says, plucking at the soft purple plaid of his own pajama shirt. “It’ll help keep you warm and clean.”

He unzips the back of the shirt, then sets it down on the floor in front of Sans. He guides each of Sans’ paws into the sleeves, then tugs it up his forelegs and wraps it around his back, swiftly zipping it into place over his spine. Sans stands remarkably still for the procedure, sniffing warily at his own sides once the shirt is in place. 

“There,” Gaster says, satisfied. “Now you’re starting to look like a kid.” He refrains from adding, _instead of a meticulously-crafted biological anti-human weapon._ He strides towards Sans’ crib. “Let’s get you to bed, huh?” 

Sans steps tentatively after him—each stride is too long and too high, as though Sans is attempting to avoid touching the underside of his sleeves. Gaster tries not to laugh. He really does. “Er,” Sans says, taking another exceedingly high step in Gaster’s direction. “Ah, ah, ah.”

“Ah, ah, ah, huh? You scolding me? You sound like Asgore.” He grins, crouching and opening his arms for Sans. Sans stumbles a little faster in his direction. When he reaches Gaster, Gaster scoops him up and cradles him against his chest. Sans sighs and relaxes. “You’re being just a little bit dramatic. You’ll get used to it, don’t worry. You’ve spent too long as a nudist already.”

“De,” Sans protests. 

“No, no, I get it, it’s a lifestyle. But it’s an _adult_ lifestyle, and you are the absolute farthest thing from an adult. You’re wearing clothes, and that’s final, mister.”

“Ter. Ter ter.”

“Nope, no arguing. I won’t have it,” Gaster says, laughing and setting Sans down in the crib. “I simply won’t have it.”

“Tit.”

 _“It._ Not tit.”

“Tit. Tit tit tit tit tit.”

Gaster rubs his face, as though that could possible wipe away his grin. “Oh, suit yourself, you tiny heathen. What shall we read tonight, hm?” He drifts towards the bookcase, and Sans paces anxiously on the inside of his crib, glowering at the rails. “How about _Newtonian Physics for Babies?_ I, um—I bought that one special for you. Only one copy in the Underground. I thought you might appreciate it.”

Gaster takes a seat in the rocking chair next to the crib. Sans curls up on the mattress, poking his muzzle between the rails and peering intently at the book as Gaster cracks it open to reveal a picture of a yellow ball. “This,” he says, although he feels just a little bit foolish to be reading something so simple, “is a ball. The ball feels the force of gravity. We can’t see gravity. It is the force that keeps us on the ground…”

Sans is yawning within seconds and asleep within minutes. Gaster carefully slides the book back into place, flicking the nightlight on the wall on (it’s shaped like a little rocket) and flicking the overhead lights off. He slips out of Sans’ room, leaving the door open, and then heads to his own. He works on his Core papers for a little while, before finally collapsing into his bed and shutting his eyesockets. He’s home. For a moment, he feels more peaceful than he can ever remember feeling—and then he sleeps.

* * *

Gaster jolts awake when a howl crashes through the house and into his dreams. He groans, rolling over and burying his head under a pillow—just for a moment. Then he drags himself out of bed and into Sans’ bedroom. The child falls silent when he sees him, pacing the length of his crib in agitation. 

“Good—” He glances at the clock on the wall. 2:17 AM. “Good morning, Sans. What seems to be the problem?”

“Ar-row-row-ow,” Sans wails, ducking his head and chewing at the rails of his crib. There are already several dents there. 

“No, no, don’t do that,” Gaster says blearily, waving his hands gently at Sans’ muzzle. Sans jerks back, whining. “You mustn't chew things.”

Sans rears onto his hind paws, bracing his front paws against the rails and whimpering pathetically at Gaster. “Lo, ‘aster.”

“Hello, Sans.”

“Lo!”

Gaster reaches in and scoops Sans up. Sans fits his front paws over Gaster’s shoulders, snuggling close to him and burying his face against Gaster’s neck. “What is it, hm? Are you hungry? Thirsty? Let’s see if we can’t make you something.”

He heads downstairs and makes Sans an offering of pork meal and warm milk. Sans turns his nose up at both, burrowing closer to Gaster. Gaster tries DT/M50—Sans laps up a little bit of that before shoving his nose back into Gaster’s neck. 

“Little one, I can’t stay with you all the time,” Gaster says, heading back towards Sans’ room. “You need to sleep on your own. I know Asgore let you sleep in his room, but you’re old enough now to—” He pauses. _Is_ Sans old enough to sleep on his own? Surely he is. Most monsters start sleep training when they’re six months old. Sans is well past that. He’s nineteen months old—nine, developmentally, if one compares him to regular monsters. “Besides, you slept on your own back in the lab. I don’t see what’s different now.”

“Ow.”

“I mean, you had Lucky and Jackson checking in on you, but it isn’t as though you slept in their beds.” He sets Sans back down in his crib. Sans sits down, his eyes wide. “I promise you I’m not leaving again. I’m just sleeping down the hall, and I’ll see you in the morning.” 

He turns his back on the crib. Sans howls. 

“Hey, hey, hey, no—shhh, Sans.” Gaster turns back, making desperate placating motions with his hands. “Shush. It’s okay. I swear I’m not leaving the house. I’m not even leaving the floor.”

Sans stares at him and then, very pointedly, points his muzzle at the ceiling and howls again. Gaster groans. Don’t give in. Don’t give in, don’t do it, don’t—

* * *

Gaster wakes up the next morning because Sans rolls over in his sleep and kicks him very enthusiastically in the spine. He mumbles wearily, flopping onto his stomach and burying his face into a pillow. After a moment, he feels the mattress shift as Sans stirs. A small bundle of bones curls up against his side with a contented sigh before falling still again. Gaster slings an arm out to rest it over Sans’ back, and then he dozes. 

When he wakes up fully, the clock reads 7:07 AM. He sits up gingerly, trying not to disturb Sans, and rubs his eyesockets. He swings his legs over the side of his bed, standing and stretching himself out. His spine clicks and pops. He creeps as quietly as he can from the bedroom, then goes to fill the bathtub with DT/M50 for Sans’ morning soak. Once that’s done, he prepares breakfast: fish meal and sliced strawberries for Sans, toast and strawberries for himself. Unfortunately, that’s all the free time he has, because as soon as he sits down to start devouring his toast, Sans takes it upon himself to howl the whole town awake. 

Gaster stumbles upstairs, and then back downstairs with a hefty blaster in his arms. “I think,” he says, yawning, “that perhaps you should begin learning to eat using silverware.”

“Mmph.”

Gaster sits Sans down in one of the chairs. Sans digs his claws nervously into the wood, but quickly refocuses once Gaster sets his breakfast down in front of him. Gaster scoops up a spoonful of fish meal. Sans leans forward, gulps down the fishmeal and subsequently the spoon, which clatters down the inside of sternum and drops onto the floor instead of vanishing. He jumps in surprise, which results in the misplacement of a paw; he slips off of the chair with a clatter and a yelp.

“You know what,” Gaster says, scooping a startled Sans back into his arms. “Maybe we’ll try silverware when you’re older.”

After breakfast, Gaster wipes Sans’ muzzle clean, then pulls off his pajama shirt and tosses it into the laundry. Sans yaps joyfully once the shirt is gone, rolling himself across the carpet and squirming against the rug. Despite his obvious delight at being naked once again, Sans _does_ allow Gaster to dress him before they go shopping. He tolerates another t-shirt, along with a pair of gray sweatpants. His winter coat goes on next, as well as his four little booties, his scarf, and his knit hat, until he looks more marshmallow than monster. 

Gaster is convinced that, swaddled in so many layers, Sans won’t be able to do more than waddle through the snow. Additionally, Snowdin is much emptier and quieter than the capital—so it won’t hurt to let Sans walk alongside him, this time. He opens the front door once he’s pulled on his own coat and boots, and Sans hesitates in the square of bright light that falls into the living room. 

“Come on,” Gaster says, stepping outside. The snow squeaks and crunches under his boots. “It’s safe, see? This is called snow. It’s what happens when water gets very cold and turns into ice crystals, which fall from up there.” He points at the ceiling of the cavern high, high above them, shrouded in dense white fog. “It’s perfectly harmless, though it is a bit chilly.”

Sans takes a tentative step outside, shaking his paws—though Gaster thinks that has more to do with his booties than the snow. Gaster gently shuts the door behind him, then strides into the main road, where the snow has been packed down more firmly. Sans wobbles along behind him, darting uncertain glances over his shoulders, his tail held low. 

“It’s alright,” Gaster says, crouching in front of him and opening his arms. “Here. Would you like me to carry you for a while?”

Sans burrows into his arms as soon as he reaches him, and Gaster stands. He carries Sans further into town, walking slowly to allow the child time to observe everything around him. “This is Snowdin,” he says, eyeing the buildings fondly. He’s always had a soft spot for Snowdin. “It’s a town—a collection of houses and businesses. A few miles away is Waterfall, and after that is Hotland. Perhaps we’ll visit those, someday.”

Their first stop is the shop. Gaster steps into the warmly-lit building and hears Sans sigh in relief, both at the warmth and the security of the walls around them. “Well, hey there, travelers,” the shopkeeper greets him cheerfully. “I haven’t seen you around before.”

“Hello, ma’am,” Gaster says, smiling politely at her. He’s reluctant to put Sans down, so he uses two magically-manifested hands to sign his words in the air. “No, I don’t suppose you would have. My, er—son and I just moved here yesterday.”

“Well, I’ll be! Welcome to the neighborhood, then. We don’t get many newcomers. How are you liking it so far?”

“It’s a lovely town. Very—quiet.”

“That it is. It’s not large, but the folk here are all mighty friendly. So.” She leans her elbows on the counter, propping her face in her hands. “What can I do for ya?”

Gaster purchases a variety of food supplies, as well as a fat cinnamon bunny for Sans to munch on. As the shopkeeper packs his supplies into several paper sacks, Sans tentatively peeks out at her. He’s taken to keeping his muzzle hidden in Gaster’s neck, but evidently curiosity has finally gotten the better of him. The shopkeeper notices him watching and waves, smiling. 

“Hey there, little fella. Who might you be?”

Sans’ tail thumps shyly against Gaster’s arm.

“This is Sans,” Gaster says. “Oh, and I’m afraid I forgot to introduce myself—I’m Dr. W.D. Gaster.”

The shopkeeper's eyebrows raise. “Dr. W.D. Gaster? _The_ Dr. W.D. Gaster? As in _The Royal Scientist_ Dr. W.D. Gaster?”

“Ah.” Gaster rubs the back of his neck sheepishly, bracing Sans with another magic hand. “Yes, the same.”

“Maternity leave, huh?” The shopkeeper laughs warmly. “Even for royal scientists. Where would we be without it?” She sticks a calloused purple paw in his direction. Gaster shakes it with his uninjured hand, relieved. “Good to meet you, Dr. Gaster. I’m Erika Lensburry. If you boys ever need anything, just holler, and I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thank you very much, Mrs. Lensburry. We appreciate it.”

“Please, please, none of that _missus_ stuff—just Erika’s fine.”

“Very well, Erika. Have a good day.”

Gaster’s next stop is Grillby’s—he decides he won’t stay long, as he doesn’t want to overwhelm Sans, but he _does_ want to introduce him to the concept of crowds. Plus, he misses Grillby, and he wants to introduce him to Sans. The bell jingles merrily above his head as he ducks through the door, and Grillby glances up as the light in the room shifts. The flames along the crest of his head pop yellow with surprise, and Gaster smiles sheepishly at him.

“Hello, Grillby.”

 _...hello,_ Grillby signs. _What is...that?_

“This is Sans,” Gaster says, taking a seat at the bar and keeping Sans settled in his lap. Sans side-eyes the patrons warily, trying his best to squeeze through Gaster’s ribcage. “My son.”

Grillby stares at him. 

“I know it’s sudden,” Gaster says, studying the whorls of the bar’s wood. “And it’s, ah—a bit of a long story, but that’s the gist of it. I have a son. His name is Sans. I wanted to introduce you.” He bounces Sans gently, and the child grumbles in return. “Sans, this is Grillby. He’s a good friend of mine.”

_Does he speak Hands?_

“A bit,” Gaster says. “About as much any baby can speak something, although his paws don’t really allow for signing.”

_Baby?_

“Yes. He’s nine months old.”

_...you’ve had him a while, then._

Gaster squirms uncomfortably. “For a...bit, yes. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I was trying to work through some things.”

_I see. His...other parent?_

Gaster nods jerkily, although the lie sizzles unpleasantly beneath his sternum. 

_Understandable._ Grillby leans forward, bracing his elbows on the bar and peering at Sans. Sans peeks cautiously at him, then buries his muzzle against Gaster again. _Shy, isn’t he? I bet I know where he gets that from._

“Heh. Yes, I suppose. He, uh—he likes hamburger.”

_Does he?_

“Very much.”

Grillby whisks a way for a moment, smoothing his palms down his apron. When he returns, he slides a plate with a hamburger and fries onto the bar in front of Gaster. _On the house._

“Oh, no, you really don’t have to—”

_Consider it bribery. I want my friend’s son to like me._

“I’m sure he would like you without the bribery,” Gaster insists. He hears Sans snuffling at the air, however, peeking out at the bar again. His eyes go round as they fix on the hamburger. “Although...perhaps the bribery helps.”

_I thought it might._

Gaster reaches forward, pulling the plate closer and tearing off a piece of the burger for Sans. “Here,” he says, offering it to him. “Grillby makes the best burgers in the Underground. Grilled with free-range fire.”

Sans snaps up the hamburger, only barely missing the tips of Gaster’s fingers as he does. His snuffling increases tenfold, and he unfolds himself from Gaster’s lap, bracing his front paws (after Gaster has quickly plucked his booties off) on the bar and leaning forward to scarf down the rest of the burger. He makes it halfway through the fries before he flops back against Gaster, groaning. Gaster makes a great personal sacrifice (not—he fucking loves fries) and finishes off the fries for him, cleaning his fingers neatly against his teeth. 

“Delicious, as always,” he tells Grillby when he comes to collect their empty plate. “Thank you very much.”

_You’re more than welcome, Gaster. And if Sans would ever like a playmate, I’m sure Fuku would be more than happy to have another child around to entertain._

“What a good idea. I’m sure Sans would love to meet her, once he gets settled in.”

Sans still won’t meet Grillby’s eyes, but his tail thumps quickly when he near the two of them, and he watches Grillby’s hands raptly as he signs. Gaster slips out of the bar before the lunch rush hits—that would be a bit much for Sans, he thinks—and heads back to their house. He takes off Sans’ coat and boots, and Sans flops out on the rug in front of the couch to nap. After carefully moving Sans off of the floor and onto the couch, Gaster decides to use his free time doing something productive—Asgore had, as expected, given him indefinite paid leave, provided he continued to work from home and attend to important meetings and lab research.

So, after putting his groceries away, Gaster heads upstairs. He searches for the Project Blaster folder—cancelled though it may be, he still wants to keep a record on Sans’ adjustment to civilian life, if only for future reference. Strangely enough, he can’t find the folder anywhere. Perhaps he left it back in the lab? He’ll have to check next time he goes there. In the meantime—

Gaster reaches for his Core reports and gets to work. 

He works late into the afternoon, until Sans howls demandingly for him downstairs. He files his papers away, then jogs into the living room, where Sans scowls at him. “‘aster,” he scolds, because _clearly_ Gaster should be at his side every moment. “Tit.”

Gaster snorts.

He takes a seat on the couch, and Sans hops up and curls into his lap, sighing heavily. “How was your nap, hm?” he asks, smoothing a hand down Sans’ back. 

“Hm.” Sans hums, yawning widely enough that the split of his chin opens a few inches. “Hmhmhm.”

Dinner that night is chicken meal and half of a cinnamon bunny for Sans, and instant noodles for Gaster. After they eat, they head up to Sans’ bedroom to play with his new toys. Sans still loves playing tug and fetch, but he’s become more interested in the monster toys, too. Although he, um. He does destroy several stuffed animals, in his attempts to play with them. His teeth and claws are simply too sharp for such roughhousing against a creature held together only by slim thread and cottony solidarity.

One quick bath and a bedtime story later, and Sans is asleep in his crib. Gaster sneaks back to his own bedroom and collapses onto his bed. Stars. Who knew raising a child could be so exhausting? (He doesn’t mind it. Not really. Not for Sans.) 

* * *

The next few days pass in a blur of pleasant routine. They wake up (Sans always ends up back in Gaster’s bed, no matter how hard Gaster tries to get him to sleep in his crib), eat breakfast, and do _something_ outdoors. They visit the library, one day, and visit the inn on another, just to introduce themselves and allow Sans to adjust to the outside world, instead of being cooped up in a single room with limited social interaction. (Gaster still cringes, when he thinks about that.) 

Sans, for the most part, is still hesitant about strangers and new places. He prefers to be held when they’re outside of the house, and most of the time, he’s got his face buried in Gaster’s neck while Snowdin’s residents coo at him. He _is_ starting to warm up to Grillby, however—they try to visit the bar early each afternoon for a quick lunch, and Sans quickly comes to associate Grillby with good food. 

Once they get back from lunch, Sans will nap and Gaster will work on his projects. He’s got a meeting coming next week—he’ll need to find a babysitter for Sans. Some quick calls confirm that Alphys would _love_ to take him for a few hours that day, and Gaster thanks her graciously. After Sans’ nap, the two of them will play and eat dinner. Sans’ vocabulary is improving vastly each day—it’s incredible how quickly he picks up on new sounds and meanings, although he has yet to string together any coherent words. He’s ridiculously smart, and Gaster is proud of him. He supposes he’ll have to hire someone to teach Sans proper Common—Gaster _speaks_ Common, technically, but it’s so heavily butchered with his goddamn inconvenient accent that no ordinary monster can understand it. Right now, Wingdings is the primary accent Sans speaks with, but unfortunately, his paws aren’t adept enough to allow him to sign his words such that other monsters can understand him. Learning proper Common will be essential for him if he ever wants to communicate with anyone _other_ than Gaster, and Gaster is beyond frustrated that he can’t teach normal Common to him. Fuck Wingdings, seriously. 

After dinner, it’s bathtime—which Sans has come to love—and then a bedtime story. Sans will fall asleep in his crib, inevitably wake up and howl, and Gaster will give in like the pushover he is and bring Sans to his bed to finish the night. The only thing that blemishes their domestic routine is the black, empty, _soulless_ space between Sans’ ribs.

Gaster thought he’d succeeded. He thought he’d done it _right._ So what—what now? Is Sans doomed to be soulless for the rest of his life? Gaster can’t bear the thought of that. What’s a life without love? What has he _done_ to Sans? He wallows about it, more often than not, as he tries to fall asleep. But then, one night, one precious night—

Gaster wakes up drenched in sweat (ridiculous! he doesn’t even have _skin,_ why should he sweat?) and panting. His chest aches fiercely, and he grips his sternum with shaky fingers. His head rings. What the hell? Is he sick? Maybe it was the sudden change in environment, moving from the pleasant, warm capital into the brittle chill of Snowdin. Yes. Yes, that has to be it, he hasn’t been sick in _ages—_

Two doors down, he hears Sans begin to howl—but this isn’t his ordinary howl. It’s much higher and sharper, breathless with terror. Gaster is on his feet and bolting down the hall before he has time to process moving.

“Sans?” he gasps, raking his eyes over the bedroom as he bursts inside. Sans scrambles to place his front paws on the crib’s rails, his eyes wide. 

“Lo!” he wails, fat white tears dripping from his eyesockets. “‘aster ‘aster ‘aster!”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, shhh—” Gaster stumbles over to the crib, scooping Sans up and cradling him against his chest. He rocks him softly—he’s never done that before, never, but right now it seems imperative that he does. Sans sobs (god, fuck, that’s not an animal sob, that’s a _child’s_ sob), clawing desperately at Gaster’s arm. “What’s wrong, huh? Are you hurt? Are you sick?” If Gaster’s sick, then maybe Sans caught something, too, maybe that’s what’s frightening him—he’s never been sick before, he doesn’t know what he’s feeling or how to deal with it—

Gaster fumbles to flick the overhead lights on, raking his eyes across Sans as soon as he can. He doesn’t appear to be injured, but he continues to wail like he’s been sliced open. Gaster rushes to grab the vitals’ system, quickly checking Sans’ temperature and pulse. His temperature is no cause for concern, but his magic pulse has spiked. That doesn’t narrow the culprits down any. Stress? Some disease that hasn’t caused a fever? A—a nightmare, perhaps? 

“Oh, what’s wrong, little one?” he murmurs frantically, squeezing Sans close to him. “Shh, shhh, I’m here, I’ve got you. You don’t have to be scared.”

“‘aster!”

“Yes, shh, hush now, I’m here, I’m right here.” He smooths a shaking hand across the back of Sans’ skull. God, what is he supposed to do? He should—he should call Asgore, yes, that’s what he’ll do—“Here, I’m going to call Asgore and he’ll help us, okay? He’ll fix this. I—”

Gaster moves to fetch his cell phone, then freezes, because—

Because he thought he saw—

Just for a second, as Sans shifted in his arms—

He sets Sans down immediately, despite his child’s howls of protest, and unbuttons his pajama shirt with shaking fingers. He peels it off, tossing it into a far corner, and—

And there, in the center of Sans’ ribcage, rests a faint, gleaming white soulshard.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: i'm sticking with the headcanon that most monster children are born at ten months old (mostly to make the math regarding sans' age simple lol) so! developmentally, sans is a nine-month-old, despite having been around for nineteen months. however, since he's a canine, he's developed (physically) a lot quicker than a primate would've. (although still way slower than a regular dog would've. blasters are weird. are they dragons? are they dogs? who tf knows.) mentally and emotionally, his development is pretty similar to any other monster's.


	5. that's karma

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> gaster having a breakdown bc he's tired and cranky pt. ii

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: self-loathing, discussions of death 
> 
> "Remembering how my mother looked before she gave birth to my sister is frightening. But even more frightening is the feeling that I wanted them to catch me and beat me. Why did I want to be punished? Shadows out of the past clutch at my legs and drag me down. I open my mouth to scream, but I am voiceless. My hands are trembling, I feel cold, and there is a distant humming in my ears.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

Sans doesn’t stop sobbing. Gaster carries him downstairs and sets him down on the table, quickly attaching the rest of the vitals’ wires. No other vitals are altered, save the magic pulse, which Gaster now suspects is because Sans’ body is finally,  _ finally  _ producing internal magic. Not much, but enough to increase his pulse ever-so-slightly. The deep ache in his own chest must be because Sans has torn a part of his soul away from him. It certainly isn’t pleasant, but he has no idea why Sans seems to having an absolute breakdown over it. 

“Shhh,” he murmurs, unattaching the vitals’ wires and bundling Sans close to his chest again. “Shh, oh, Sans, I’m sorry. I didn’t think it would hurt. I didn’t mean for it to hurt. It’s okay. It’s okay, I promise, everything’s going to be okay.”

Is it possible for a soul to have a transfusion reaction? He didn’t think so, but he’s seriously considering it now. If Sans’ body refuses to accept the soul, then—what? What can Gaster do? He could cut his bones out of Sans’ sternum, and hopefully remove the soul in the same process. It would be a waste of a soulshard, but if it would keep Sans from suffering, then it would be worth it. He’s suffered enough because of Gaster’s mistakes. 

Sans claws at Gaster’s shoulders, struggling to stand in his lap. He leans forward, pressing his sternum to Gaster’s and dropping his chin over his shoulder. He pants in ragged gulps, his little bones shuddering. Gaster wraps his arms around Sans’ back and feels him slump into them. It—helps, he thinks, having the soulshard close to Gaster’s own soul, because Sans’ breathing eases slightly. 

“Shh,” Gaster murmurs, cradling the back of Sans’ skull with his injured hand. “That’s it. We’re gonna be okay, Sans. I’ll—I’ll figure this out.”

Shit. Shit shit shit shit. What is he going to  _ figure out?  _ He doesn’t even know where to begin. He can feel the link between his soul and the shard Sans has taken—it ebbs and flows, back and forth, as though the shard can’t quite decide where it wants to stay.  _ Stay there,  _ he wills it.  _ Please, please stay there, stay with him. He needs you more than I do. _

The link trembles, stretches, and Sans sucks in a deep breath. The little shard behind his sternum glows more brightly.

_ Yes,  _ Gaster thinks fervently.  _ Yes, just like that. Go with him. He can have it. He can have—everything he needs, anything, he can take anything from me— _

And Sans does. The pull against Gaster’s soul increases as his child drags his magic away from him, gulps it down and fills his bones with it, flushing out the remnants of the DT/M50. Gaster wills his magic out, wills it forward and into Sans—it’s like filling an endless well. Sans has never had soulmagic before, and he’s certainly never had this emotion. He’s starved for it and overwhelmed by it at the same time, and it’s all Gaster’s fucking fault. 

_ Love,  _ he whispers, and Sans’ soulshard gleams and shudders. In the safety of his mind, he can admit it: he loves his creation. Whether he meant to or not, he does. He pours that love into Sans’ soulshard as best he can, and Sans gasps and claws his spine.  _ Love. That’s what you’re missing, isn’t it? ...magic, too, but that’s not all. You’ve never felt love. As much as I tried to show it to you, you never felt it. You couldn’t.  _

Sans doesn’t answer him, not in words, but Gaster feels him shove a whirlwind of emotion back in Gaster’s direction. Darkness, numbness, vague wants, followed closely by confusion and chaos and an overwhelming, terrifying  _ need.  _ “‘aster,” he cries, and Gaster can feel the frustration that comes with Sans’ inability to communicate his needs—fortunately, he can also feel that need for himself, without Sans needing to verbally communicate it to him. It sits heavy and bitter in the back of his jaw. Sans doesn’t want his love, barely understands what love even  _ is  _ or why he should need it—

Sans just wants him to make it all  _ stop. _

“It will stop,” Gaster assures him, and Sans chokes on another sob. “It  _ will,  _ Sans. Just give me time. I’ll give you everything you need, but you have be willing to take it. I can’t take the soul back. I  _ can’t.”  _ Perhaps more accurately, he  _ won’t _ take it back unless he’s sure it will cause Sans permanent suffering. Sans is too dangerous to be left without a soul—far, far too dangerous—and Gaster couldn’t bear to see his creation killed because of the danger he poses. (Nor could he bear to see Sans live a life numb to love.) 

“Come here.” Gaster stumbles to his feet, clutching Sans close to his chest. “We’re getting Asgore. He’ll help. He will.” Ah. Gaster is—woozy, all of a sudden. He braces himself against the doorway, pulling in a ragged breath. What if Sans takes too much? What if he takes everything Gaster is? 

...Gaster would let him.

He staggers back upstairs, collapsing onto his bed with San held tightly against his chest. He yanks his phone off of the charger and quickly dials Asgore. The king’s eyes widen as soon as they fall on him. “Wingdings! You look awful—whatever is the matter? Is that Sans? Why is he crying? Oh, oh—did something happen? I’ll be there right away, I’ll—”

“We’re okay,” Gaster manages to sign, although it takes every last bit of his magic to hold his phone up while he does so. “We’ll be okay. Just—come here. Help, please.”

Asgore is moving even as Gaster speaks, grabbing his bag and rushing for the door. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to either of you.”

Ah. That’s all the reassurance he needs, then. Gaster lets his phone drop onto the bed, then rolls over and curls up tightly around Sans, who burrows closer to him. His tiny claws scrape across Gaster’s sternum, as though trying to dig the rest of his soul out. Gaster would let him. Gaster would...let him…

* * *

“Wingdings!”

Gaster jolts awake and hears Sans whine as he moves. He stills again, groaning. “Asgore?”

“Yes, it’s me—what’s wrong? What happened? Are you ill?”

Gaster shakes his head, lifting a hand to rub his eyes. “No, I just—must have fallen asleep, for a moment. Shit. It’s the soulshard.” He grimaces, sitting up and taking care to keep Sans close to his chest. He can still feel the pull of magic from his soul, although it seems to have weakened slightly. “The transfusion finally kicked in. The bone must have—must have finally set. I’m—ugh. I’m so tired.”

Asgore’s brow furrows, and he takes a seat on the edge of the bed. “The soulshard? You mean the one you gave Sans? Is it growing all at once, then?”

“Stars, that’s what it feels like.”

“So you’re telling me that you’re going through ten months of pregnancy right now. That’s what you’re telling me.”

“Ten months of pregnancy and nine months of life. But only the—hnn, soul-growing parts, I presume.”

Asgore scrubs his face with his paws. He’s done that far too often, lately, Gaster thinks. “Did you expect this?”

“Nooot particularly. Only, like. Maybe a five percent chance?”

“But you knew it was a chance.”

“Can we save Scold The Skeleton Time for a later date please? I’ll pencil you in. Just—not now.”

Asgore sighs softly, smoothing a paw over Gaster’s skull. Gaster could cry from how comforting the touch is, but he tries very hard not to. He closes his eyesockets once more. “Very well. Not now. What do you need?”

“Nineteen months of sleep and nineteen months of food.”

“Are you serious?”

“It would be ideal.”

“You can’t be serious.”

Gaster squishes his hands together. “Just, like—compact it maybe? Dehydration station. Can get a lot of nutrition into something dehydrated.”

“That may very well be, but I don’t think you’re going to manage nineteen months of nutrition in a single meal.”

Gaster cracks an eye open to peer at Asgore. “Would you promote me if I did?”

“I can’t promote you anymore, Wingdings. You are literally at the top of chain.”

“Ah. Shame.” He waves a hand dismissively. “Anyway, so barring nineteen months of nutrition and rest, I’m just gonna—lay here, for a little while. Wake me up if I start dying?”

Asgore buries his muzzle in his paws and groans. He looks up when he stands, pointing sternly at Gaster. “Just—stay here.”

“‘kay,” Gaster says, as though he could move even if he wanted to. Sans squirms against him, whimpering, and Gaster pats his shoulder gently. “It’s alright, Sans. It’s not your fault. We’ll be o—” Break for a yawn. “—okay.”

Sans doesn’t seem to be in as much pain anymore, to Gaster’s relief. He still whines miserably on each exhale, but he isn’t outright sobbing any longer—though perhaps he’s simply too exhausted to do so anymore. He rests limply against Gaster, breathing slowly, his sockets half-lidded and his eyelights dim. He—doesn’t look well. Gaster struggles to push more magic towards him, and Sans shudders and sighs. The soulshard glows brightly between his ribs. It’s larger, now, morphing towards its proper shape. As Sans rests, a low thrum begins to rumble in his chest—a purr. It isn’t a happy sound. It’s a sound of desperate self-soothing, and Gaster’s own chest aches fiercely with pity.

Asgore returns within a the half-hour, two plates balanced in his hands. “Here,” he says, setting them down on the bed. “Eat, both of you. Perhaps if Sans can take some of his energy from food, he’ll need less from you.”

Gaster sits up groggily, reaching for the plate. It’s a simple, fast meal—white rice with scrambled eggs. He’s vaguely nauseous, but he forces himself to eat nevertheless, because he’s well aware he needs the energy, even if it won’t replace the soulmagic he’s losing. It’s much harder to convince Sans. Gaster finally resorts to filling a bottle with an old favorite—beef meal and milk replacer. Sans suckles half of it, then curls up and sticks his head under his tail. Gaster doesn’t have the heart to make him to eat the rest.

“Now under the covers with you,” Asgore says, and Gaster wearily squirms into place. Asgore tucks them both in (huh—when’s the last time Gaster’s been tucked in?) and smooths the blankets down. “Would the DT/M50 help? Could Sans get some of the magic he needs from that?”

Gaster shakes his head. “Nn—nice thought, but I’m afraid not. Soulmagic and DT/M50 are very different things, else—else everyone would be using DT/M50 for everything, wouldn’t they? DT/M50 works to maintain a structural form, and can be used for attack and defense, in the event there’s not a soul to do those things, but other than that, it’s useless. Bodies with souls can’t metabolize it. Does that—make sense?”

“Absolutely not.”

Gaster flaps a hand, frustrated. “DT/M50 is a substitute when soulmagic can’t be used. It doesn’t provide love or emotion, like a soul does, just—energy. If a monster has a soul, the soul won’t allow it to use DT/M50. It rejects it, because it’s not the same thing. It doesn’t want to taint itself with anything else, so it’ll just flush the DT/M50 out.”

“Damn.”

“It was a nice idea.”

“It was.” Asgore sets a hand on Gaster’s shoulder, then on Sans’ back. Sans stirs only briefly before falling unnaturally still and quiet again. “You boys get back to resting. I’ll wake you for dinner.”

“Thank you, Asgore,” Gaster murmurs. “Make it up to you later.”

He sleeps again.

* * *

Gaster’s not sure how many days they spend like that—sleeping and eating and nothing more. (Asgore will tell him later that it was nine days.) Sans, for the most part, remains uninterested in eating until he can be coaxed into nursing a bottle. Gaster himself finds no great joy in eating, but it  _ does  _ give him the energy he so desperately needs. 

Fortunately, Sans never takes enough soulmagic to damage Gaster’s physical form—the only time his HP dipped below what it should was that first arduous night, and that damage was quickly repaired by a bite of healing food. Gaster is sure Sans doesn’t  _ want  _ to take so much from him, but the amount of soulmagic it requires to sustain his form is substantial. He’s not a large monster, as of yet, but he’s certainly no infant, and he’s playing catch-up on the amount of soulmagic he needs to keep his bones solid. 

Gaster explains all of this to him, sleepily, one evening. “...so you always need a certain amount of magic to keep your body intact. We’re lucky you didn’t take any damage when the soulmagic flushed the DT/M50—maybe that was what hurt you so. Flushing all of that energy couldn’t have been pleasant. Soulmagic and DT/M50 just don’t—” He yawns and rubs his eyes. “—don’t play nicely together. It’s too bad. That could be really...really useful, I think…”

He dreams of icebergs, that night. Massive, towering walls of white, unlike anything he’s ever seen before, outside of his books. The air curls around him, bitter and frigid, and even without skin, he begins to shiver. When he looks down, he sees Sans sitting beside his feet, his tail curled over his paws. 

“‘Gaster,” he says, without glancing up. Faint blue rings surround his eyelights, which have darkened in response. His eyes look much more human that way. Much more...ominous.

“That’s a lot of ice to melt,” Gaster says. 

Sans pads forward, his bones well-suited to blend into the snow around them. He’s hard to see. Gaster should’ve...should’ve brought his coat along. Even skeletons get cold sometimes, and Sans is so little and weak. 

“Well, you’re right,” Gaster murmurs, heading after him. “I guess we’d better get started.”

He rolls over in bed, and Sans squeals and kicks him in the hip because, evidently, he doesn’t enjoy being crushed to death beneath a skeleton at least three times his size. Gaster shuffles off of him, flopping out on his stomach, and Sans climbs onto his back and curls up between his shoulder blades. He doesn’t dream anymore. 

Sometimes he’ll wake up and Asgore will be there, sitting on the edge of the bed, staring ever-so-contemplatively at the wall. Gaster will say something, but he won’t have the energy to sign, and Asgore will smile and set a warm paw on his skull. “All is well,” he says. “Rest, Wingdings. There’s nothing to worry about now.”

Gaster rests.

Another night—or is it another afternoon? Another evening? He’s not quite sure about time, any longer—he dreams of thick clouds and fat white snowflakes sprinkling his cheeks, soaking through his heavy overcoat. Sans sits beside him again, leaning heavily on his legs. Their breath comes in thick white plumes. Completely unnecessary, breathing. They don’t have lungs. It’s only instinct that keeps his chest rising and falling, only magic that warms the air between his ribs. 

“You know,” he tells Sans, and his child looks at him with fervent yellow eyes. “I grew up in a place like Snowdin, only you could—you could see the sky there.” He crouches, setting a hand on Sans’ head. He can see his son’s skull through the hole in his palm. “When it wasn’t snowing, anyway. And the weather would change—most of the time there was snow, but sometimes, in the summer—” He tips his face up, remembers the ancient warmth of sunlight against his cheeks. “—everything would melt, and it would be warm.”

Sans lifts a paw. Ice water drips from his claws. The snow sizzles around their feet.

“I hope you can see the sky one day, Sans.”

* * *

“Who knew skeletons could sweat so much? Honestly,” Asgore says, amusement in his voice as he wipes down Gaster’s bones with a damp washcloth. “How do you get this filthy doing nothing for days on end?”

“Nothing is hard work,” Gaster murmurs, leaning gratefully against Asgore. Sans squishes comfortably between them, sighing. He seems—better. Not completely well, but better. He isn’t whining any longer, although he’s still utterly exhausted, and his self-soothing purr rarely tapers off.

“Grillby came by this afternoon.”

“Did he?”

“Mm-hm. He was worried about the two of you when you missed lunch for the third day in a row. I told him you were alright, but I didn’t give him any details. I think he was surprised to see me here.”

“Well. You  _ are  _ the king. Speaking of—don’t you have more important things to be doing with your life?”

“Than looking after you and Sans? Nonsense.”

“I can look after us now. It’s not so bad anymore.” He shifts slightly, and his joints shriek their protest at him. His breath hitches. “I’m just—creaky.”

“Mm-hm,” Asgore says, in a tone that means he’s definitely not buying it. Ah, well. Gaster’s not much of salesperson.

“It’s true,” Gaster insists mildly. “I’m a creaky old man now. That’s what having children does to you, isn’t that right?”

“Oh, hush.” Asgore moves the washcloth onto Sans, gently wiping it across his spine and ribs. Sans murmurs contentedly. “Although—how much longer do you think this will go on for, Wingdings?”

“It’s unprecedented.”

“Is that Wingdings for ‘I’ve no damned idea, Your Majesty’?”

“Precisely.”

“Perhaps I should call Alphys. Maybe she knows some way to help.”

“Huh. Actually, that’s a good idea.”

“I have those, rarely.”

* * *

“H-hello, Dr. Gaster! I’m here.” Alphys drops her bag next to the bed, taking a seat in the desk chair and scooting up beside the mattress. “You don’t, um—you don’t look very well. Objectively speaking.”

“That’s your scientific analysis?”

“It c-certainly is. What did you  _ do?”  _ She nudges him around, positions him so she can glance over his bones, studying the faint white pulse of his soul behind his sternum. “I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

“It’s a soul transfusion,” Gaster murmurs. “Sans needed a soul, so I gave him part of mine, and now it’s—growing, the way it should have been all along. That’s the current hypothesis, anyhow; if you’ve anything better, I’m all ears. Metaphorically.”

“A  _ soul  _ transfusion? G-Gaster! If this succeeds, that could be r-revolutionary, that c-could be—”

_ “If  _ it succeeds. Let’s not get out hopes up quite yet, Dr. Alphys. Besides, it’s not that revolutionary. Monsters have been giving each other souls for generations. That’s how babies are made. Didn’t you have that class?”

“Oh, hush, you. This is d-different and you know it.”

“Yes—because Sans is my clone, minus a few modifications. My soul is genetically his, as much so as it is mine. Our bodies, our magic, our souls—they’re all just parts of the same thing. Undoubtedly, that makes this easier. I doubt a transfusion would work between two monsters who  _ weren’t  _ genetically identical.”

Alphys boops his nasal bones lightly with her scaly palm. “Shush, m-mister. Let me enjoy the moment of scientific revelation.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Once Alphys has finished enjoying her moment of scientific revelation, she digs her soul monitor out of her bag and scans his soul. “Your stats all look good—ah, attack, d-defense, and HP max are down some, but your EXP and LV are still the same.”

“What about Sans?”

“Oh, yes—may I see him for a moment?”

Gaster hands Sans over, though the child whines in protest, hooking his claws through Gaster’s ribs to cling. Untangling him is a bit of an ordeal, but eventually Alphys sits back, cradling Sans in her arms and running the monitor across his ribs as he squirms. “Erm—nothing yet, looks like. The scanner isn’t registering the shard as a soul of its own.”

Gaster groans.

“B-but that doesn’t mean it won’t! M-maybe it just needs a little more time to grow, that’s all. Don’t lose hope, Dr. Gaster. It’s certainly starting to  _ look  _ like a soul. And—and look at his eyes!” Alphys hoists Sans up, her hands hooked beneath his armpits. Sans looks unimpressed. “They have glow-irises. That means he’s almost ready to use m-magic, right? And he wouldn’t be able to use magic if he didn’t have some to spare, so—so I think you’re giving him everything he needs. It just needs some time to settle in.” She rattles Sans lightly in excitement. “He’s growing up!”

“Please don’t shake the baby.”

“Oh, right, sorry—” She sets Sans back on the mattress, and he pads over to flop onto Gaster’s chest with a long-suffering sigh. “Anyway,  _ he  _ looks healthy, but y-you—oof.” She grimaces.

“Noted.”

“N-not that you look bad! Just, um. Just that you don’t look great. He’s taking a lot of magic from you,” Alphys says, and Sans glances over, going very still. “I’m honestly surprised he hasn’t knocked more than he has o-off of your HP cap. How are you feeling?”

“Sore,” Gaster admits—no point in withholding information from a fellow scientist, “and tired as shit. Do you think—” He falters, then takes a deep breath. “Do you think my HP cap will continue to drop?”

“As in, do I think you’re g-going to survive?”

Gaster nods, short and sharp.

“Y-yes, I do. You’re too stubborn to die.” She adjusts her glasses, then glances away, her shoulders slumping. “But—it doesn’t look good for your health. Even if you d-do survive, you won’t be nearly as strong as you were before. You’ll have to be very careful.”

“...eighty?”

Alphys grimaces.

“...fifty?”

“Dr. Gaster—”

_ “Thirty?” _

“It isn’t as though it matters. You aren’t planning to fight anyone—”

“How much will I have left?” Gaster asks, his voice cracking with panic. “How much—”

“My best guess would be twenty.”

Gaster’s breath catches. “Twenty HP.”

Alphys nods, wringing her hands. “Of course, that’s just—based on the trendline from the data you sent me earlier. It could change. It could always change, Dr. Gaster. Science can be unpredictable.” She nods at Sans, who has curled into a small ball on top of Gaster’s chest. He’s trembling. “You know that better than most.”

“Sans?” Gaster sits up, cradling Sans close to him. The child refuses to meet his eyes, but Gaster can see the well of white tears at the edges of his sockets. “What’s wrong? Are you in pain? Sans?”

Sans bawls. 

“Oh—oh, no, hey, it’s okay.” Gaster hugs him tightly, and Sans wedges his muzzle into Gaster’s neck. “I’m sorry, Alphys. I don’t know what’s wrong with him. He’s been doing so well, I just, I thought he was getting better and I— I—.”

“M-maybe I’m stressing him out,” Alphys says, rubbing the back of her neck. “I should go. He p-probably isn’t used to strangers in his home—”

“No! No, don’t go, you don’t have to go—”

Alphys freezes, her eyes widening, and Gaster shrinks into himself, his cheeks flushing purple with humiliation. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—you can go. You don’t have to stay.”

“Dr. Gaster?” Her brow furrows with concern, and she moves to take a seat on the corner of the bed, her tail in her lap. “Are you—”

“I’m okay. I’m okay, I just—wasn’t thinking, I’m sorry. Shh, Sans. Shh, it’s okay, little one, it’s okay, I pr-promise it’s gonna be okay—”

“Oh, Dr. Gaster, it’s a-alright. What’s wrong?” Alphys reaches out a sets a hand over his. Over the bandages. Over the _hole he put through his own palm_ what the fuck is he doing he just keeps fucking things up he’s so _stupid_ he was never meant to be a father, the fuck does he know about parenting, and he’s fucking Sans up already, just look at him! He’s crying, and he’s—crying, and he’s—

“Wingdings?” Asgore barrels through the bedroom door, his eyes wide. “Oh my god, are you okay? What’s wrong? What happened? Alphys, what—?”

“It’s not her fault,” Gaster says, scrubbing furiously at his eyesockets and clutching Sans closer to him. “It’s not. It’s mine. It’s all  _ fucking mine—” _

Asgore takes a seat on the bed next to him, hauling Gaster (and his permanent attachment, Sans) into his lap. “Now, now. There’s no need to be so hard on yourse—”

Gaster bawls.

Asgore rocks him, shushing them both softly. His beard makes a very good place for Gaster to hide his face as he cries. It’s only slightly scratchy, and it smells like flowers and sweaty fur. He balls his hands in Asgore’s shirt, and Asgore rubs a paw soothingly up and down his spine. After a quick, murmured conversation, Alphys slips out of the room. 

“There you are, Wingdings, Sans,” Asgore murmurs, allowing Gaster to cry himself out. Sans seems to be trying very hard to cry himself out as well—tears stream endlessly down his face and drip off of his jaw and into Gaster’s lap. “You’re both going to be alright. I know all of this is very stressful, but I promise you things will get better. You just have to stay determined.”

“I’m f-fucking it all up,” Gaster gasps, hunching his shoulders. 

“Dear, I’m afraid I don’t understand what you said.”

Gaster reluctantly pries his fingers from Asgore’s shirt, his hands trembling as he signs. “I’m fucking  _ everything  _ up.”

“Oh, come now, you are not. Certainly, you’ve made a few mistakes, but who hasn’t?”

“I created a child, and raised—I raised him like a  _ dog!  _ A weapon!”

“Now, we both know that was unintentional.”

“I should have seen it,” Gaster hisses, his shoulders shaking with fury. “I was so  _ stupid.  _ I knew he was sentient. I knew he was smart. Why did it take me eighteen fucking months to figure out what I was doing was  _ wrong?  _ I ruined him, and then I thought—I thought—!” He lets out a cracked, warped mockery of laugh. “I thought I could  _ raise him.  _ What a fine job I’m doing of that, Asgore!”

“You expect too much of yourself,” Asgore chides, setting his hands on Gaster’s shoulders. Sans shudders and burrows closer to Gaster, and Gaster squeezes him tightly. “As always. You’ve been doing a wonderful job raising him, for a first-time parent. He adores you.”

“He doesn’t adore anyone,” Gaster snarls. “He doesn’t have a  _ fucking soul—” _

“So you’re giving him one!”

“That’s nothing special! Every parent in the world does that, Asgore. I did it nineteen months  _ too late,  _ and now it’s  _ hurting him,  _ and there’s  _ nothing I can do about it  _ unless I want to condemn him to a life as a loveless, selfish  _ beast—” _

“Give him here.”

“What?!”

“Give Sans here, Wingdings. Now. I’m going to take him out to Alphys. All this shouting isn’t good for him.”

Gaster’s hands shake. “You can’t take him from me.”

“No. I can’t, and I won’t. I’m hoping you’ll realize that all of this is doing him absolutely no good—so if this is the way you want to get your emotions off of your chest, then I believe you’re smart enough to know that it’s best if you allow me to take Sans somewhere calmer.”

Gaster buries his face against Sans’ skull, breathing in the stale-bone scent of him. He’s shivering against Gaster, his breath coming choppy and fast, and Gaster’s guilt is a roaring black wave in his chest. “Yes,” he rasps. “Yes, you’re right. Here.” He gently pries Sans away from himself, although the child wails in protest. 

“Thank you, Wingdings. I’ll be back in just a moment. I’m sure Alphys will take good care of him for you.” Asgore bundles Sans to his chest, bouncing him gently in his arms and cooing softly. Almost immediately, Sans’ crying begins to taper off as he stares up at the king. Why can’t Gaster do that? Why can’t Gaster comfort him that way? Why can’t Gaster do  _ anything right—?! _

He flings himself back onto the bed as Asgore leaves, buries his face against a pillow, and screams. 

“Now,” Asgore says, when he returns a few moments later. “Please continue.”

Gaster obligingly removes the pillow. “—and I should  _ never have made him in the first place!  _ He’d be better off with someone else, you know he would. Maybe—maybe once the soul’s set, I can—find him another home. I’ve already started his socialization, so it would be easier, and—safer, because—” Another bout of cracked laugher. “Did you hear, Asgore?  _ Did you hear?  _ He’s taking everything from me. Twenty HP! That’s what Alphys thinks I’ll be left with. A fucking  _ froggit  _ could kill me, and I think I’m going to survive raising a  _ blaster?  _ Ha! Ha ha  _ ha!” _

He slashes his hands through the air, signing violently. “Not that I don’t deserve it, mind you—Sans can take everything he needs. It’s my fault he’s this way. That’s karma. There is no life made without sacrifice. I mean, maybe—maybe he won’t  _ try  _ to hurt me, but a stray blast—hell, if he  _ trips  _ on me once he’s an adult, I’d be down for the count. I don’t want to die, Asgore.” 

He chokes on his breath, wrapping his arms around himself. He feels his eyelights flicker out as he stares into the endless void in front of him—death and darkness and unknowing. For a moment, Time buckles around him, and he sees through her, glimpses the bones of their universe. He squeezes his eyes shut tightly. “I don’t want to die. But I’m going to, aren’t I? I don’t how how, or when, but—I know it. I will become nothing. Everyone will forget me. Creation and destruction are intrinsic, are they not? You can’t have one without the other. My creation will be the death of me. And I know—I know I deserve it, but I’m still so  _ scared.  _ I don’t want people to forget. I don’t want to not exist anymore. I want to stay here. I want to stay alive, but Sans is going to kill me, and—and I’m going to let him.”

He glances over at Asgore, who watches him with an unbearably sad expression. “I don’t expect you’d understand,” Gaster adds, more quietly. “You wanted a child, and you—you raised a human without fear. You’re a far braver monster than I.”

Asgore bows his head. “Everyone dies eventually, Wingdings.”

“Yes. I suppose so. I’m just being a baby about it.”

“What you feel is okay.” Asgore reaches out, resting a paw over Gaster’s sternum, over the weakening thrum of his soul. “It’s okay to be scared. It’s okay to be unsure. Death is scary, and—raising a child is a terrifying thing.”

“What?”

“Yes, that’s right. Raising children is the scariest thing I’ve ever done. Ah, the day Asriel was born—” A weary smile flickers across Asgore’s face. “I was afraid to hold him. What if I messed up? What if I ruined him? He was such a big responsibility. To create life, to mold it—that’s nothing to be taken lightly. And at the expense of my immortality, too.”

“Then why’d you do it? If it’s so scary, why is it even worth it?”

“Because if I can share the miracle of life with another person, then—isn’t that worth it? I’ve lived a long time, Wingdings. I’ve traveled and I’ve seen incredible things, I’ve made the most amazing friends and done what I could to make the world a better place. I’ve loved. Toriel and I, we wanted someone else to be able to do that, too. We wanted to create another life, so that  _ they  _ could experience all the wonderful things we have. Besides, even after we would have passed, our children would have— _ should  _ have—survived to carry on our legacy. Isn’t that its own kind of immortality?”

Gaster rubs his eyes, releasing a shaky breath. “I—I suppose.”

“But you understand, don’t you? You’ve thought about this. You wouldn’t have given Sans your soul unless you were sure it was the right thing to do. Perhaps this isn’t what you expected, or wanted, but—things will be alright. You’ll see. Yes, you’re going to die, but because of that, Sans will be able to live and learn and love the way you did. Besides, you’ve still got a few decades to go. Don’t get impatient yet.”

“Ah.” A wobbly smile tugs at Gaster’s mouth. “You’re right. That wouldn’t do.”

‘No, it wouldn’t.” Asgore smooths a paw across the top of his skull. “You have time to come to terms with this. All will be well, little one. Trust me.”

“Were you ever...scared?” Gaster asks. “Of Chara? I mean—humans are so dangerous. Did you ever think they would hurt you?”

“...”

“Asgore?”

“Yes. The thought crossed my mind, once or...twice.”

“How did you stop being afraid?”

Asgore glances away. Gaster reaches out and curls his fingers into his shirt again. “Trust, I suppose. I had to trust that they wouldn’t, lest I worry constantly. And...well, even if they did decide to hurt me, what could I do about it? I couldn’t fight back. I couldn’t hurt my own child. I determined that if they ever did attack me, I would either restrain them or spare them. So, then, with my choice already made—what good did worrying do me? But—” He laughs softly. “Chara wouldn’t have ever hurt me. Silly to think it, even for a moment.”

“Yeah,” Gaster says, curling up on his side and pressing his forehead to Asgore’s knee. Asgore rests a hand on his shoulder. “Silly to think it.”

“But understandable, in your case,” Asgore adds. “Sans is going to be a very powerful creature, is he not?”

Gaster nods miserably.

“Yet that doesn’t mean he’s going to be  _ bad.  _ Power and cruelty don’t go hand-in-hand, my dear. You have nothing to fear from that boy. You’re going to raise him right, and he’s going to love you.”

“But I keep messing up,” Gaster protests weakly. “I keep hurting him.”

“This? What you’re doing right now, giving him a soul? This isn’t a mistake. Yes, perhaps it hurts him now, but—if he can love, Wingdings? If he can love, than it’s beyond worth it. Love tempers all pain, for better or for worse. Besides, he’s doing better every day.”

“I make him cry.”

Asgore inclines his head. “I made Asriel cry once because I shaved my beard.”

Gaster huffs out a weak laugh. “Yeah?”

“Oh, yes. He would bawl every time he saw me for almost a week straight.”

“But you didn’t actually hurt him. You didn’t create him in a test tube and lock him in a tiny room all alone and teach him  _ tricks  _ because you thought he was an  _ animal—” _

“Wingdings,” Asgore scolds, squeezing Gaster’s shoulder. “That’s enough. What’s done is done. Yes, you made your mistakes, but you mustn’t wallow in them. You need to look forward. You need to start building a new life for the both of you. Leave the old one behind. It’s good to remember, lest you make the same mistakes, but it isn’t good to beat yourself up about them forever. Let it go. Forgive yourself.”

“It isn’t my forgiveness I need.”

“Sans won’t even  _ remember  _ what happened a few years from now. Besides, even if he did, I’m sure he would forgive you. You didn’t know what you were doing—”

“Because I was stupid.”

Asgore pinches Gaster’s nasal bones and Gaster yowls. “Dr. Wingdings Gaster, you shut your mouth. You are the smartest person I know—a fool, in many respects, but not  _ stupid.  _ You  _ made a mistake.  _ Stop dwelling on it. That isn’t what Sans needs from you. He doesn’t need you to hate yourself because of what you did, he needs you to take responsibility and  _ fix this.” _

“I don’t know  _ how,”  _ Gaster insists, looking pleadingly at Asgore.

“Just be his dad. That’s all he needs from you.”

“I don’t know  _ how!” _

“Oh, Wingdings.” Asgore scoops him up again, sighing softly. “I know you don’t, and that’s not your fault. But for what it’s worth, you’re doing a very good job. I’ve told you—I’m always here if you have questions or need assistance. I also have a few parenting books, if you’d like to borrow those.”

Gaster’s eyes widen. “Parenting... _ books?” _

“Mm, yes.” Asgore smiles. “How did I know you would like the sound of that?”

“Because I’m your professional nerd.”

“Because you’re my professional nerd—and professional nerds are only allowed to wallow in self-pity for half an hour biweekly.” Asgore stands, setting Wingdings on his feet and dusting off his rumpled turtleneck sweater. “The rest of the time, they need to believe they’re smart, and capable, and brave. Think you can do that?”

“Will you demote me if I can’t?”

“No. I’ll simply have to come over and teach you how,” Asgore says, puffing out his chest. “Want me to pencil you in? I’m open Monday evenings.”

“Ah. No, that will be unnecessary.”

“Good. In that case, let’s go have some hot tea and see to your son before you’re off to bed again.”

Wingdings stumbles after him, wincing with each step, but—but as long as he’s moving towards Sans, he can tolerate it. He could tolerate anything, he thinks. “Asgore?”

“Hm?”

“How did you—do that, earlier?” Wingdings asks hesitantly, rubbing the back of his neck. “With Sans? You made him stop crying very, um. Expediently.” 

“Ah.” Asgore grins at him. “A clever trick. You just hold them like the lil cute babies they are, and you rock a little bit, or bounce—repetitive motions are very soothing to little scamps and adults alike, you know. And you look at them, so they know you’re paying attention, and you make cuddle noises.”

“Cuddle noises?”

“Yes. You know, cooing, or murmuring, or babytalk or lullabies—none of that rational noise. They don’t need reasoning, they need affection. Or, er—food, or baths, or sleep, or playtime.”

“How do you know which one they want?”

“You pick up on it—like learning a new language,” Asgore explains. “It takes time, but you’ll get there. Asriel, for example, had a much higher-pitched cry when he was hungry than when he was sleepy. They’re subtle differences, but they’re there.”

“Duly noted.”

“Atta boy.” Asgore wraps an arm around his shoulders. “You’re going to be a great student.”

“Funny. Not what any of my teachers said, ever.”

“They should have been paying more attention, then. Now, then—hullo there, Sans, Alphys! How’s the tea coming along? Oh, Sansy, look who’s here—it’s your daddy! Come say hi! He’s missed youuuuu—”

* * *

That night, as Gaster lays curled around Sans, his son reaches up and places a paw on his cheekbone. His eyes (yes, Alphys was right—the glow-irises are faint, but there; they’re pale blue tonight) focus intently on Gaster’s face. “Hello, Sans,” Gaster says.

“Lo, ‘aster,” Sans says absently, his eyes flickering across Gaster’s eyes, his nose, his chin. 

“What are you doing?”

“Ering.” Sans follows this completely nonsensical word with a string of equally nonsensical animal sounds, chitters and trills and warbles.

“Fascinating.”

Sans’ eyes scan critically across Gaster’s sternum, his ribs, his arms and hands. His gaze locks on the bandage around Gaster’s palm. 

“Nothing to worry about,” Gaster tells him. “It’s healing well. Just like yours, hm? We should be able to get rid of the bandages soon.”

“Hmm.”

“What? You’re not convinced? It’s true.” Gaster unwinds the bandage, showing his palm (or, er—lack thereof) to Sans. “See? All better.”

Sans sticks his muzzle through the hole. “Ew.”

“Yes, that’s what I think, too,” Gaster admits, pushing his son’s nose out of his hand. “It is in a fairly obvious place. Perhaps I should have taken from my own sternum, if only to hide it more easily, but the bone there is thicker than your own, and I didn’t want to alter it more than I had to. The metacarpals were just about the same thickness, though they don’t fit together as neatly as I would like them to. Science is full of decisions, Sans. Sometimes it’s—difficult to make the best ones.”

“Hmmm.”

“What? You don’t think so? Ah.” Gaster waves a hand. “Maybe you’re right. What do I know?”

Sans sighs and rests his head on Gaster’s collarbone, his eyesockets closing. A soft purr starts in his chest again—this time, Gaster thinks the sound might actually be...content. A smile flickers across his face.

“Goodnight, little one.” Gaster sets a hand on his head, allowing his own eyes to close. “Sleep well.”

That night he dreams of holding icecubes in his hands. The hole in his palm has filled back in, and cold water trickles between his fingers and down his arms. He shivers. Sans stands next to him again, gazing contemplatively at the icecubes. 

“Melting,” Gaster explains (his voice sounds hollow, hollow, hollow), “is a change from one state of matter to another. It’s what happens when something becomes warm enough that its particles separate and move faster. It requires an input of energy; it’s an endothermic reaction. An energy-in reaction, if you will. But the smaller something is, the less energy it requires. It’s easier to melt an icecube than an iceberg.”

“Ah,” Sans says, nodding sagely—and then he begins to melt.

Gaster startles awake, choking on his breath. He exhales sharply, slumping back against the mattress when he realizes where he is. Damn. Soulsharing makes for some weird dreams. He’ll have to make note of that in his report. Whether or not it becomes public knowledge, the data will still be invaluable in the future—

Beside him, Sans murmurs sleepily.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Gaster says, wiping his eyes. When he glances over, two eyelights watch him from the darkness. They seem…different. Brighter. Closer together. “Did I wake you? I had the strangest dream. You were melting. You were—” He squints. Sans feels lighter, against his chest. Smaller. What—?

He sits up and fumbles to turn on the lamp, blinking away the sting in his eyes when he does. He focuses his gaze on Sans again, and then freezes, because—

Because there, cradled in his lap, is not a blaster but an infant skeleton.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey. hey gaster. hey buddy. i think the riverperson told u the hounds in snowdin could melt. why didnt u listen buddy? the riverperson is full of lots of good information and I Love Them as a foreshadowing tool.
> 
> also fun fact: the headcanon for this fic is that skeletons’ glow-irises are colored according to the primary traits of their own souls (although the souls themselves are still white.) bby skeletons can glow lots of different colors because their personalities are changing so much as they grow, but as adults, skeletons typically only glow one or two colors (but only one color will be their primary color, the color that best fits them and that they glow most often). gaster’s primary (and only) glow-color is purple (perseverance!) whereas sans’ primary is cyan (patience!) and his secondary color is yellow (justice!). paps’ is probably gonna be orange. (‘cause you know like—like when you seperate purple you get,,,blue and red and if you dilute them you get,,,cyan and orange and that’s,,,bc sans and paps are just seperate mini versions of gaster’s soul/magic alksjg)


	6. a terribly lonely thing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: illness, vomit, brief references to child abandonment bc gaster's dad was a piece of garbage 
> 
> “No one I've ever known is what he appears to be on the surface.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

“What,” Gaster says, “the actual fuck.”

The infant coos at him. 

_ “Sans?”  _ Gaster picks the child up under his armpits, hoisting him into the air. Yep. That’s a human-shaped skeleton—his shoulder blades have gravitated to his back instead of his sides, his muzzle has shortened and flattened into a wide grin, and the crest of his head has smoothed into a round skull. His vertebrae no longer have exaggerated spinous processes, and his hands and feet have blunt little phalanges instead of talons. His tail is dramatically shorter—shorter, even, then Gaster’s own. He’s so  _ tiny.  _ He wasn’t large before, but he can’t weigh more than ten pounds now. Developmentally accurate for a—

For a nine-month-old skeleton.

“What have you done?” Gaster whispers.  _ Is  _ this Sans? Has his son been replaced by this strange creature while he slept? Are changelings  _ real?  _ “And how the hell did you do it?”

“‘aster!” Sans says, delighted.

Yes. Yes, that’s Sans’ voice. “Sans.”

“Lo!”

“Hello.” Gaster sets him down on his back, peering between his ribs. The soulshard glows as brightly as he’s ever seen it, dense and white and perfectly shaped. He can still feel the link between them—Sans’ soulmagic hasn’t finished strengthening yet. It won’t, until Gaster dies, but he seems to be taking less magic now. “I think—maybe I’m still dreaming, Sans.”

“Ans,” Sans agrees, reaching forward to brush his little baby fingers along Gaster’s cheeks. “An an an an an.”

“Yes,” Gaster decides, letting out a breath of relief. “Just a dream. I really must make note of this tomorrow.”

Gaster stumbles out of bed, keeping Sans in his arms. He’s so much easier to carry, now, and he curls his fingers sleepily around one of Gaster’s ribs as they head for the kitchen. A quick drink will get Gaster back down—hopefully without worsening his dreams. He shuffles downstairs, wiping his eyes blearily, and sees Asgore snoozing on the couch. He tip-toes past him, trying to be as quiet as he can while he prepares a mug of warm milk and cinnamon. 

“Here,” he murmurs to strangely-shaped Sans, pouring some of the milk into a bottle and offering it to him. “Would you like to try?”

Sans suckles readily at the bottle, while Gaster sips his own milk more slowly. 

“Wingdings?” Asgore shuffles into the kitchen, yawning and licking his fangs. “What’re you doin’ up so early? And with the baby—” His eyes flicker dreamily across the bundle in Gaster’s arms, then snap back, going wide. “The baby! What the hell happened to him?”

“Oh. You’re weirded out too?” Gaster asks, peering down at Sans. “I think this is a dream.”

“Well, you can’t be dreaming because  _ I’m  _ not dreaming!”

“Would you know you were part of a dream if you were part of a dream, Asgore?”

Asgore opens his mouth. Shuts it.

“Precisely.”

“Wait, wait, I know how to figure this out—you can’t tell time in dreams,” Asgore says, holding up a hand. 

“Is that true?”

“Yes,” Asgore says firmly, glancing at the clock. “It’s 5:46, is it not?”

Gaster glances at the clock. “So it would appear to be.”

“Then that means neither one of us dreaming. So I ask again—” He flails his hands at Sans. “What  _ the hell happened?” _

“Oh.” Well, if he’s not dreaming, he supposes he actually has to worry about this. Anxiety begins to curl beneath his sternum. “Um. I’m not—sure? I just woke up and he was like this.”

“You just  _ woke up  _ and your son had magically shapeshifted into a tiny human-shaped creature while you slept?”

“Er—yes.”

“Er,” Sans agrees, succeeding in spitting milk up over his chin. Gaster reaches for a washcloth.

“He doesn’t appear to be in distress,” Gaster says, dabbing the milk away before heading for the vitals’ system. He attaches the wires to Sans, glancing over his data. “No. Everything is as it should be. Magic pulse is down, but I assume that’s because he’s so much smaller now. This is an energy-efficient form, whereas the blaster is...not.”

“So he just— _ chose  _ to become energy-efficient all of a sudden? Why? And how would he even know how to do that? Monsters don’t just shapeshift,” Asgore says, sitting down heavily on the couch. “Not unless, you know—it’s in their genetics. Are you a shapeshifter?”

“Not as far as I know.”

“But he is?”

“Maybe he finally had enough magic to waste on shifting,” Gaster says, taking a seat next to the king and holding Sans out. Asgore readily takes him, nestling Sans against his chest and patting his back, despite the fact that Sans lacks a gastrointestinal system and, therefore, does not need to be burped. Ah, well. Whatever makes Asgore happy. “Or maybe he just realized that this was a preferable form because it uses less magic to maintain.” Maybe he wanted to look like Gaster.

“Alright, alright, so the kid had motivation. But  _ how  _ did he do it?”

“Perhaps he’s young enough that his form hasn’t settled. The soul could still be fluid enough to manipulate.”

“Babies don’t just change shape because their soul isn’t set, Wingdings.”

“Yes, because most babies are born with their soul already set in. He isn’t exactly an ordinary baby. You know that. Besides, I suppose—well, I suppose he  _ does  _ have a skeleton’s genetics alongside a blaster’s genetics.”

_ “Does he?” _

Gaster scowls. “Yes. Believe it or not, genetics are a terribly complicated thing to modify without fucking up, so I didn’t bother separating all of the skeleton DNA from all of the blaster DNA. The chances of me scrapping something important were too high. I wasn’t sure how the skeleton and blaster phenotypes were interconnected, so I simply deactivated the skeleton phenotype and activated the blaster one. The genetics for both are still there, but he must have flipped their activations somehow.” 

Asgore arches an eyebrow and settles Sans into his arms again, beginning to rock him. Sans babbles softly to himself, eyes half-lidded. “So he  _ is  _ a shapeshifter?”

Gaster throws his hands into the air. “I guess!”

“Did you know that could happen?”

“I mean—yes? It was always a possibility if the blaster had access to excess magical energy, which is why their concentrations of DT/M50 would have been so carefully controlled. The amount of intelligence and finesse it would take, though—I didn’t think any of them would be smart enough to figure out how to rearrange their own genetic structure.”

“He gets his smarts from you.”

“Clearly.”

“So, wait— _ all _ of his DNA came from you, right?”

“Right.”

“So you have skeleton and blaster DNA too, right?”

“I mean, yes, although the blaster DNA is dormant and I only ever use it to create blasters out of magic.”

“So how come you’ve never been able to shapeshift?”

Gaster opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again. “Skeletons don’t shapeshift.”

“How do you know?”

“Because—because it’s not in any of the literature, and I never saw anyone do it, when I was a kid. I must have changed something else in Sans’ genetic structure when I activated the blaster DNA. I told you, genes are weirdly interconnected. Pleiotropy! Pull on a gene that codes for a jawbone and somehow you fuck up a foot. Pull on a gene or a—a couple thousand genes to switch activate phenotypes and somehow you make a shapeshifter.”

“Hmm.” 

“I’ll look into it, okay? See where I fucked up this time.” He groans, scrubbing his face with his hands. “How did I know so  _ little  _ when I made him?”

“Well,” Asgore says, “he was a prototype, right? They’re made for learning things from.”

“Yeah. I guess.” Gaster sighs. “I just wish I’d been more knowledgeable going into this whole thing. I feel like I didn’t expect anything the way I should have. I should have spent more time researching. I was—over-hasty.”

“Perhaps,” Asgore admits. “But fortunately, everything’s still turned out well. I mean, this is a better form for him, right? It’s more energy-efficient, and it’s certainly less intimidating.”

“I suppose so,” Gaster says, steepling his fingers. “I wonder if he’ll be able to change back at will.”

“Well, if he’s as stubborn as his father, I’m sure he’ll find a way.”

Gaster’s mouth quirks up. “Yes. I’m sure he will.”

Asgore bounces Sans lightly in his arms. “Yes you will, little one. Yes you wiiiill. You’re pretty adorable like this, too. Honestly, Gaster, you went all-or-nothing on the cuteness factor. An infant  _ and _ a puppy! What’s not to love? Here, you’d better take him.” He holds Sans out to Gaster, who scoops him up. “It’s too early for him to be up and about. It’s too early for  _ you  _ to be up and about.”

“Or you,” Gaster says, standing up. “Get some sleep, Asgore. I’ll make breakfast in the morning.”

“Oho, will you?”

“I will, as a matter of fact. I’m feeling—better. Sans is certainly taking less magic, maintaining this form.”

“When will he stop?”

“Taking magic? ...never, I assume. Not until the day I die. That’s how children grow, isn’t it? Asriel never stopped taking from your soul.”

Asgore glances away. “No. Not until—well. You know.”

“I know.” Gaster rests a careful hand on the king’s shoulder. After a moment, he says, “On the bright side, Sans should be taking less now, and everything will be back to normal. I think his soul may have finally finished shaping—it looks pretty good, right?” He bends some, so Asgore can peer into the warmly-glowing hollow of his son’s chest.

“It looks like a good soul, Gaster. One of the best.”

“Thank you.” He offers Asgore a smile, small but warm. “Goodnight, Asgore.”

“Goodnight, little ones. I’ll see you in the morning.”

Gaster carries Sans back to the bedroom, curling up around him. Sans is already asleep, but Gaster spends a moment simply studying his new form. This is odd. This is very, very odd, and he’s surprised he’s not freaking out more about it. But when it comes to Sans, well—he supposes he’s learning to expect the unexpected. His son is a werewolf? Sure. Why the fuck not?

* * *

“Rise and shine, Your Majesty,” Gaster says, leaning over the couch to jostle Asgore awake. “Breakfast is served.”

Asgore groans and wallows. 

“Come, now, what kind of example is that to set for the child?” Gaster chides, heading back to the kitchen. Sans glances up at him from his place beneath the table, his eyes shining. “Sans, your Uncle Asgore is being a baby.”

“Noooo’mnot,” Asgore slurs, rolling off of the couch and onto his feet. “Don’t listen to him, Sans.”

“Ans!” Sans decides. He does look rather odd, sitting under the table. It wasn’t so odd when he was a puppy, but—perhaps Gaster should invest in a high-chair, now that Sans will actually fit inside of one. 

“Come out from there, now, please,” Gaster says, crouching next to the table and opening his arms. Sans crawls over to him, and Gaster scoops him up and takes a seat at the table with Sans in his lap. The child’s breakfast is oatmeal with mashed pears and a small side of pork meal. Ordinarily, Gaster would elect to feed him something more hearty, but—well, ordinarily, Sans also has devilishly sharp fangs to eat with. This form’s teeth are flatter, and it’s clear that Sans hasn’t quite grown all of them in yet. Whereas the puppy teething stage had passed quite some time ago, it appears this form didn’t age quite as rapidly. Sensible, Gaster supposes, as a canine’s physical development is significantly faster than a primate’s. 

Asgore shuffles into the room, rubbing his eyes and snuffling at the air. “Smells good.”

“Thank you,” Gaster says, gesturing to Asgore’s plate. His breakfast looks significantly tastier than oatmeal, and Sans has taken notice, eyeing his bacon jealously. “Please, eat. It’s the least I can do.”

“Hey, I’m not gonna turn down a free meal, but don’t feel as though you owe me,” Asgore says, sitting down and reaching for a fork. “What are friends for, right?”

“Well—thank you for everything, nevertheless. Sans and I both appreciate it.”

“Is that right?” Asgore coos, leaning forward to beam at Sans. “Do you appreciate it, Sansy?”

“Da!” Sans says, reaching for his oatmeal with enthusiastic little hands. Gaster scrambles to grab a spoon. “Da da da!”

“Awwmygod Wingdings look he’s trying to say your name—”

Gaster snorts, offering Sans a spoonful of oatmeal. In return, Sans offers him a scalding look of betrayal. A spoon? Nonsense. Sans eats only with his  _ face.  _ “I assure you, he already knows my name, and that isn’t it.”

“What?” Asgore gapes at him. “You can’t possibly expect him to call you  _ Gaster  _ for the rest of his life.”

“‘aster,” Sans demands, grabbing at the bowl.

“No, you may not eat with your face right now. You don’t have a muzzle. If you stick your mouth in there, you’ll stick your whole face in there too, and that will be most unpleasant. We are going to use a spoon as long as you are in this form. And as a matter of fact, Asgore, I hadn’t thought that far ahead. I’ve been a little preoccupied giving my soul to the skeleton werewolf child I created in a test tube.”

“My god,” Asgore whispers, horrified. “Can you imagine it? ‘Oh, Dr. Gaster, won’t you read me a bedtime story? Dr. Gaster, may I go outside to play? Dr. Gaster, my tummy hurts.’ Stars, I  _ can _ imagine it. Wingdings, promise me. Promise me you won’t let your child call you Dr. Gaster.”

Gaster rolls his eyes, offering Sans the spoon again. He grabs it with his chubby baby fist and crams it into his mouth. Well. One step closer to right, at least. “I promise I won’t let my child call me Dr. Gaster.” Sans chews noisily on the soft rubber of the spoon, evidently baffled by its inedibility. “He doesn’t know how to pronounce doctor.”

“Then what will he call you?” 

Gaster shrugs. “Whatever he wants to, I suppose. Wingdings. Father, perhaps.”

Asgore groans. “Oh, Wingdings, no. That’s cold.”

“Is it? That’s what I called my father.”

“You didn’t  _ have  _ a father.”

“Precisely. The name was used only in passing reference, as a convenient way to indicate genetic relations. Should I have called him The Great and Wise Donator of my Y Chromosome?”

“You aren’t your father, Wingdings. I think he should call you Papa,” Asgore offers. “Or Dada.”

Gaster winces. “Oh.”

“What’s wrong? Don’t you like them?”

“It’s just—it’s a bit familiar, isn’t it?”

Asgore stares at him. Sans gobbles down another bite of oatmeal, when it’s offered, gnashing his teeth enthusiastically on the spoon.

“What?” Gaster demands. “What is it?”

“Wingdings. You are  _ raising  _ him. You feed him. You wash him. You cloth him, you read him bedtime stories, you let him sleep in your bed—but calling you  _ Dad  _ is where you draw the line?”

“I suppose you’re right,” Gaster grudgingly admits, poking unenthusiastically at his own eggs while Sans chews his oatmeal. “Very well.  _ Dad _ will be fine.”

“Did you hear that, little one?” Asgore says, his voice taking on the obnoxiously cute tone that means he’s addressing Sans. “Your daddy’s gonna let you call him  _ Dad.  _ Aren’t you a lucky lad?”

Sans coos happily at him before wedging another spoonful of oatmeal into his mouth. Good lord, is he trying to ram it through the back of his skull? Gaster tugs at the spoon, but Sans locks his teeth onto it. Fine. Let him hold it, then. If he’s clever enough to figure out how to reconfigure his own genetic code overnight, he’s clever enough to figure out that he’s not getting more oatmeal if he doesn’t release the goddamn spoon.

The rest of breakfast is a hassle (who knew feeding an infant primate would be so much harder than feeding an infant canine?), but Gaster survives. He wipes oatmeal and pork meal off of Sans’ face (and neck, and hands, and arms, and—) before looking wearily at the various selections of clean  _ quadrupedal  _ clothes he has for his son. 

“Tell you what,” Asgore says, patting his shoulder. “I’ll stop by Thresh’s on my way back to the capital, how about that? You just send me along with the specifications.” 

Even with an imminent visit to Thresh’s, Gaster figures it will be a few days before he can get Sans into some proper clothes—so his son is back to crawling around the house butt-naked, which seems to delight him to no end. Gaster does manage to slip his striped hoodie over his head—it’s a bit too long, and the sleeves aren’t quite in the right place, but at the very least it should keep him warm. 

After the breakfast dishes are cleaned and put away, Gaster reclaims his son from Asgore (who had been introducing him to the wonders of cartoons) and sets him down on the table. He sweeps the soul monitor Alphys had left for him over Sans’ ribcage, holding his breath and—yes! There! The monitor registers the soulshard as a fully-fledged soul, now, and Sans’ stats pop up beside it. 

“He has stats!” Gaster ~~squeals~~ says in a very dignified manner. (And, and! Gaster’s HP cap sits at 60, which isn’t anything to brag about but isn’t anything to sneeze at, either. He thinks it must have something to do with Sans’ decrease in size and energy requirements. Thank the fucking stars. He’ll have to let Alphys know.) “Asgore, look—1 HP, 1 AT, 1 DF. They’re not the highest, but I’m sure they’ll improve as he gets older. That’s what always happens, right?”

“Right,” Asgore says cheerfully, leaning down to admire Sans’ shiny new soul. “That’s just what happened with Asriel. Although—would you believe?—he was born with  _.5  _ HP. And he was a boss monster! I tell you what, this kid’s gonna be a powerhouse when he gets older.”

Sans reaches up and yanks gratefully on Asgore’s beard.

With the emergence of Sans’ full soul, and with Gaster’s drastically improved health, Asgore finally has to take his leave. He doesn’t seem thrilled about it, but even  _ he  _ can’t deny his kingly duties for much longer. “I’ll call every day, alright?” he says, wagging a finger at Gaster. “And you’d better answer, or I’ll come down here and mother-hen you some more. You take good care of that boy, and of yourself. Let me know if you need absolutely anything.”

“I will. We’ll be fine. You worry too much, Your Majesty.”

Sans, who has grown quite attached to Asgore, is most upset to see him go. He doesn’t freak out when Asgore walks out of the door (he’s gotten quite used to Asgore coming and going between rooms). He only freaks out a few hours later, when he realizes Asgore isn’t coming back. He fusses all through lunch, and playtime, and cries before naptime, and then again after naptime. He settles slightly during bathtime, playing aimlessly with the bubbles, and then bursts into tears when Gaster takes him out of the water. 

“As as as,” he wails, tears rolling down his cheeks.

“Asgore will be back to visit soon,” Gaster soothes, picking Sans up, and—oh, what was it Asgore had said? Hold him like a baby, and bounce him, and look at him, and—and make cuddle noises. Gaster tries his best. He cradles Sans in his arms, bouncing him rhythmically. Sans looks up at him, breath hitching and lower jaw trembling. Cuddle noises. Right. Okay. Cuddle noises. Um—

“My mother, ah—she u-used to sing me lullabies,” Gaster says, clawing through the dusty cages of his childhood memories. What did she used to sing? “When I was scared, or upset. Um. Would you like to hear one? They’re kind of silly, and I haven’t—I’m quite a rusty singer, but I guess you’re a captive audience, so—here goes nothing, I suppose.” 

He rocks Sans gently, pacing back and forth in their little bathroom, and quietly begins to sing. “‘Baby mine, don't you cry. Baby mine, dry your eyes. Rest your head close to my heart, never to part, baby of mine…’”

His voice is soft and rough, and he’s undoubtedly out of tune, but Sans watches him, utterly rapt, so he doesn’t stop. He sings until his son’s tears dry, until his eyes close and his little body falls still and loose. He sings the old songs he remembers his mother singing to him, all those years ago. When he runs out of those, he sings the quiet songs his friends have shared with him. He hums gentle classical tunes as he settles Sans into his crib and smooths a pale blue blanket over him. He himself falls asleep with lullabies running through his mind, and he is content.

When Sans wakes him in the middle of the night, wailing because he’s tired of being alone, Gaster brings him to bed and sings him back to sleep.

* * *

So, as it turns out, being out sick for nine days has left the Royal Scientist royally behind on his work. He missed several important Core meetings, so as soon as he can (and as soon as he’s sure Sans will be okay), he drops Sans off with Alphys and heads to the lab. His office smells sad and stale, and he feels a flicker of guilt. He’s neglected it. So he sets about in a furious cleaning spree, filing away spare papers and dusting all of his surfaces—all of them. 

Once he’s done that, he rummages through his filing cabinets, searching for his Project Blaster folder—but it’s simply nowhere to be found, which puts him in a rather sour mood. That was valuable damn data, and he can’t believe he’s lost it. Ergh. Of course there are encrypted copies on his computer, but it’s not the  _ same.  _ He makes back-up copies of his notes on soul transfusion (see if he loses  _ those!)  _ and files them away in his locked cabinet, stuffing the originals back into his interdimensional box. 

He takes a seat in his office chair, pulling up the data on the Core schematics and the results from the latest test trials. He reviews them briefly, prints off the papers he’ll need for the meeting, and heads for the conference room. On the way, he ducks into the break room for a cup of coffee. Several of his fellow scientists greet him warmly, and he trades small-talk with them for a while, sipping his coffee. It’s—good. Ordinarily he doesn’t enjoy small talk, but he’s missed being around his peers, and he welcomes the chance to catch up with them. (He tries to ignore the stares the hole in his palm receives.)

As he leaves the break room, he’s nearly trampled by Jackson, who squawks and swerves away from him in a flutter of brown feathers. “Oh my goodness, Dr. Gaster! I’m so sorry. I didn’t see you there.”

“Quite alright,” Gaster says, brushing a few down feathers off of his sweater. “No harm done.”

“How have you been?” Jackson asks, looking earnestly at him. “We’ve missed you around the lab.”

“I’ve been well. A little under the weather, but no worse for wear,” Gaster says, offering him a mild smile. “Yourself?”

“I’ve been doing wonderfully—actually, I’ve been tinkering with some personal side projects,” Jackson says. “I’d like to show you later, if you have time. Get a second opinion.”

“I’d like that. I should have time in a few hours, if you’d like to stop by my office. Are you going to the Core meeting now?”

“I am!” Jackson trots along beside him, manilla folders held tightly to his chest and wings ruffling with excitement. “I’m excited to see what Uthiop has been doing with the heat engines. She’s managed to compact them even more, hasn’t she?”

“That’s what I heard.”

“Man, I can’t imagine being an engineer. I just can’t get my head around all the math.”

“Well, it’s not for everyone, and that’s alright. I myself quite enjoy it, but then, I’ve always been fairly good at mathematics.”

“I think I prefer biology, personally.”

Gaster tilts his head, thinking of Sans—thinking of creating life from nothing but a scrap of DNA and a lump of magic. A smile flickers across his face. “Yes. It is a fascinating subject.”

“Speaking of biology—how is 01 doing? Or—what are you calling him now?”

“Sans.”

“Sans, okay. How’s he doing? Rumor has it you took him in yourself.”

“Wel, rumor’s right, for once. He’s doing well. Socialization is a slow process, but I think we started it in time. He’s starting to adjust to strangers and small crowds, and he isn’t quite as nervous when we travel outside of the home. He’s adapting readily to a monster’s diet, instead of the meat meals, and he’ll—well, he’ll tolerate clothing.”

“Has he developed any magical abilities yet?”

“As a matter of fact, yes. He can shapeshift now.”

“He can— _ shapeshift?” _

“Indeed. He reactivated his skeleton phenotype—” Gaster gestures at himself. “—and deactivated his blaster phenotype. I assume he’ll be able to reverse the change as well, but that’s yet to be proven.”

“Wow. I—was not expecting that.”

“That makes two of us.”

“How’d he do it?”

“An excess of magic and intelligence, I suppose.”

“Huh. So blasters can change their phenotypes based on magic levels, if they’re too smart?”

“That appears to be the case.”

“Incredible.”

“Yes.” Gaster laughs softly. “He really is.”

They slip into the conference room and take their seats. Gaster presides at the head of the table, and he organizes his notes as the rest of his Core scientists file in. Someone brings donuts. How can Gaster possibly turn down a  _ donut?  _ He selects glazed devil’s food, and scrapes chocolate crumbs from his fingers before he rises to give the opening address. (He also steals a vanilla-blueberry donut for Sans.) 

After the address, and the prerequisite small-talk, Gaster’s team share data amongst themselves. They discuss old experiments and propose new ones. They type up their combined lab report and proposals for Asgore, and draft a new list of necessary supplies and funding. They talk about Matrissa’s newest child. They talk about Gaster’s newest child. They talk about how the compaction of Uthiop’s heat engines will influence the energy output of the Core and discuss how to re-balance the climate control to prevent overheating. (Solution: upgrade ice block flow from Snowdin.) They plot a surprise birthday party for Lucky.

After the meeting, Gaster heads to the cafeteria with several of his coworkers in tow. They all eat together, and in the last little bit of his lunch break, Gaster squeezes in a call with Alphys. “Hello, Dr. Alphys,” he greets her warmly when she answers. 

“H-hello, Dr. Gaster,” she says. “How are you?”

“I’m doing well, thank you. I was just calling to check up on Sans.”

“He’s doing awesome. We just finished lunch, and now he’s napping.”

“Did he eat well?”

“He finished a w-whole quarter cup of cottage cheese and some diced mangos. He was, uh, a little fussy before he went to sleep, so I gave him a teething cracker. He seemed to like it and went right t-to sleep after he finished it.”

“Good, good.” Gaster exhales in relief. He’d been worried about how Sans would adjust to a relative stranger watching over him for a day. “Did he use the spoon well?”

“Well, he didn’t choke or throw it away, s-so I’d count it as a success. He’s a bit of a mess now, though. I’m going to give him a bath once he wakes up.”

“Probably a wise choice,” Gaster says, chuckling. “That boy. He’s a walking disaster. Well, I’ve got to be going—I have some emails to answer before I can get to my experiments, I’m afraid.”

“Eugh. Have fun with that.”

“Unlikely.” He snorts. “See you this evening, Dr. Alphys. Have a good afternoon.”

“Y-you too, Dr. Gaster.”

Gaster spends most of his afternoon answering emails (Alphys was right—eugh) and proofing reports. Jackson pops into his office shortly before dinnertime, waving sheepishly at him. “Hey, Dr. Gaster—do you still have time?”

“I do.” Anything to get away from the emails and the proofing. Anything. “Please, have a seat. What have you been tinkering with?”

“This.” Jackson’s eyes shine, and he deposits a thin black square, about the size of Gaster’s palm, onto the desk. “It’s a DT/M75 concentrator.”

“75?” Gaster frowns. He reaches out, turning the little black square over in his hands. It’s much heavier than it looks. “That’s—a bit strong already, don’t you think? And you put it in a concentrator?”

“Er, well—yes. It’s only meant to be used on very big, powerful things.”

“...like blasters?”

Jackson brightens. “Yes! Like blasters. I figured that when the project restarts, we might be able to use this to accelerate a blaster’s growth. If we attach it to one of the little ones and feed a steady stream of magic into its bones, it should adapt to the concentration fairly quickly. It can use that energy to build a bigger frame for itself. More energy can stabilize a larger monster, right? Of course, it may not accelerate their mental development, but—maybe that’s for the best. If they got too smart they could figure out how to change forms, like 01—like Sans did.”

“Jackson, that’s a—it’s a very creative idea,” Gaster says, hesitating. He sets the concentrator back on the desk. “But as of right now, it’s unlikely that the blaster project is ever going to restart. Even if it does, I doubt it will be in my lifetime. If you’d like to continue brainstorming ideas for it in your personal time, by all means, do, but—I think I need to step back from it. It’s not a project I’m particularly comfortable with anymore.”

“Oh.” Jackson’s shoulders slump. “No, it’s—I understand. It makes sense. I mean, now that you’re raising a blaster and all, it must be—weird, to think of them as weapons.”

Gaster sighs in relief. “Exactly. I’m glad you understand. Is there anything else you’ve been working on?”

“Actually, uh—this, for the Core.” Jackson pushes a blueprint towards him. “If we spread out the positioning of the icedrops from Snowdin, rather than just increase the frequency, I think we could regulate the Core’s temperature more effectively. I drafted a few proposals, but I just wanted to get your opinion first, before I brought it to a meeting, and…”

The rest of Gaster’s evening is spent trading ideas with Jackson, eating dinner, discussing exciting new ideas for the Core and answering yet more emails. Someone breaks a puzzle in Hotland, and while ordinarily it would be an assistant’s job to fix it, Gaster volunteers to go. It’s close to Alphys’, and he’ll need to stop there before he heads home, anyway. He fixes the puzzle (easy—simply a malfunction in the blocks’ rotors) and then heads over to Alphys’ lab, humming cheerfully. The door slides open shortly after he knocks, and Alphys smiles shyly at him.

“H-hi, Dr. Gaster. How was work?”

“It was good, actually,” Gaster says, stepping into the lab once Alphys steps aside. He wasn’t quite sure about how he felt leaving Sans in what is still  _ technically  _ a lab, but—well. Compared to the royal lab, Alphys’ lab is extremely homey, with plenty of room to run and play without annoying anyone. Not to mention Alphys had the day off, so he’s sure she had plenty of time to spend entertaining Sans. “Where’s the little guy?”

“He’s asleep already.”

“Ah. I thought he might be. It  _ is  _ past his bedtime.”

Alphys leads the way upstairs, and he sees Sans curled up on her bed, snoring lightly. He’s cuddling a Mew Mew figurine. Gaster’s non-existent heart melts just a little bit more. “He ate well at d-dinner,” Alphys says, gathering up the new baby carrier Gaster had bought only yesterday. (Sans seems to like it much better than the puppy carrier.) “He didn’t quite finish all of his vegetables, but he ate all of the yogurt and the turkey meal.” 

“I’m glad to hear it. He’s not really much of a vegetable person,” Gaster says, carefully buckling the baby carrier around his hips—a front-attachment, this time, although it’s also reversible, so if he ever wants to carrier his baby like a squealing, chubby backpack, he can. He reaches out, sliding a hand beneath Sans’ head and another beneath his rump, gently scooping him up and settling him so his front is flush against Gaster’s chest. “Was he very anxious?”

“I-I think at first he was,” Alphys says, helping Gaster to pull the carrier up and slide the straps over his shoulders, so Sans is held securely against his chest. “He kept crying after you left, but after lunch he seemed to s-settle down, and he even played a little bit after his bath.”

“That’s good,” Gaster murmurs, smoothing a hand over Sans’ skull as the baby mumbles softly in his sleep. “I was hoping his separation anxiety would fade, once he got used to the outside world. Now if I can just get him to sleep in his own crib for more than a few hours.” He sighs fondly.

“Oh, I’m sure he’ll get there in t-time. I was crawling into my dads’ bed until I was t-ten,” Alphys says, patting Gaster’s arm and heading back downstairs. Somehow, Gaster does not find this knowledge encouraging. “A-anyway, he’s a super cute kid, so if you, uh, if you ever need someone to watch him again, just let me know.”

“Will do. Thank you very much, Dr. Alphys. You’ve been a big help.”

“It’s n-no problem, really. Have a good night, you two.”

After Gaster leaves the lab, he hitches a ride with the Riverperson, who blithely informs him, “Tra la la—cute kids are the most dangerous kind.”

He decides to take this as a compliment.

Once they’re back home, Gaster puts Sans down in his crib and then showers before flopping into his own bed. Today was a good day, he thinks. He only wishes he could show Sans the lab, could show him  _ science,  _ but—he doesn’t want to drag him back into that world. Maybe someday, though. Yeah. Maybe someday…

* * *

Sans gets sick for the first time when he’s twenty months old (ten, if one goes by the time he was ‘born’). Gaster supposes it was inevitable. He’s been spending more and more time outside of the house, visiting Grillby and Asgore and Alphys and, undoubtedly, being exposed to thousands of germs. His immune system had been holding up surprisingly well, considering the sterility of his first few months of life, but evidently it wasn’t prepared to handle this specific strain of virus. 

Gaster wakes up in the middle of the night, as per usual, because Sans is crying. This cry sounds different than normal, however. (Asgore was right. He is beginning to learn the differences.) It’s more fearful than anything, and Gaster immediately rolls out of bed and rushes to Sans’ room. He’s standing up in his crib, clinging to the rails (he’s learned to do that recently, although he has yet to begin walking) and sobbing. There’s thick white magic clinging to his chin and shirt—vomit, no doubt.

“Oh, Sans,” Gaster says, scooping him out of the crib. Sans latches onto him, tears trailing down his face. “I’m sorry, little one. You must not feel very well. Here, let’s get you cleaned up and then I’ll see if I can’t make you more comfortable.”

He takes Sans to the bathroom, peeling off his dirty clothes and tossing them into the hamper before gently wiping the vomit from Sans’ bones. Sans whines miserably at him, wiping his palm across his nose, his breath hitching. Once he’s clean and dry, Gaster lifts him out of the tub and swaddles him in a thick yellow blanket. He carries him out to the table and hooks up the vitals’ system, which reveals elevated temperature and magic pulse, but stable saturations. 

“I think it’s only a little bug,” Gaster tells Sans, rubbing his back gently. “Viral, I’d assume. There’s no cure for that, but it will only last a few days.”

“No,” Sans mumbles—one of his new favorite words. 

“What? Would you rather it last longer?” Gaster asks, heading to the kitchen.

“No no no no.”

“Well, I can’t make it go away any faster, I’m afraid.” He fills a bottle with water and a tablespoon of oral electrolyte solution (imbued with a healing spell), then grabs an empty bowl before heading back to his bedroom. “The important thing is to keep your bones hydrated, and to make sure you replace whatever magic you lose. I’ll have Dr. Yeoman come see you tomorrow, just to be sure it’s nothing serious.”

He takes a seat on his bed, leaning back against the headboard and settling Sans on his chest. “Lo,” Sans says wearily. 

“Here. Would you like to try and drink something?” He offers Sans the bottle. Sans whines and turns his head away. “Alright, alright. You don’t have to yet—but you will need to drink something soon. You’ll only feel worse if you don’t.”

“Mm.”

Gaster leans his head back, running a hand soothingly up and down Sans’ spine. His son coughs weakly, his fingers curling tightly into Gaster’s shirt. The two of them sit quietly for a time, and Gaster hums soft little lullabies until he thinks Sans is asleep once again. After that, he snags a book from his shelf— _ Electrodynamics of Continuous Media.  _ He reads until Sans jerks awake again, gagging, and then he lunges for the empty bowl and holds it under Sans’ mouth until he’s finished vomiting.

Sans, somewhat predictably, bursts into tears again. 

“Shh, shh, shh, baby boy, shhh.” Gaster wipes his mouth clean, setting the bowl of regurgitated magic aside and scooping Sans into his arms. He rises from the bed, beginning to pace the bedroom in the hopes that the gentle rocking motion will soothe his son. “It’s okay. I know it doesn’t feel very good, but it’s okay. You’ll be alright.”

“Ba ba,” Sans wails, scrubbing his face with his little palms.

“You wanna try the bottle?” Gaster asks, holding the bottle up hopefully. 

Sans smacks it away. “Ba  _ ba!” _

“Oookay, not the bottle, then.” He slips into the bathroom, wetting a washcloth with cool water before returning to the bed. He settles Sans down next to him, setting the washcloth across his forehead. Sans reaches up to touch it, pulling it down so he can look at it. “It’s just a washcloth. It’ll make you feel better if you leave it there.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.” Gaster gently sets the washcloth on his forehead again. “Go back to sleep.”

Sans goes back to sleep.

When he wakes again, shortly before dawn, Gaster tries to offer him the bottle. This time (thank the stars) Sans accepts it, suckling slowly at the water. He manages to get about a third of the bottle down before he turns his head away. He tries valiantly to go back to sleep, but his cough is in full swing, now, and he startles himself awake more often than not. He calls Dr. Yeoman, who agrees to come visit them as soon as she can, and then he calls to let Asgore know he won’t be at work that day, which, naturally, results in a flurry of worried questions and suggestions. 

“Asriel liked juice more than water when he was sick, and—oh, Toriel had the best way to break a fever. You stick them underneath the blankets and take out one limb at a time, wipe it off with a cold washcloth, and then stick it back under the blankets. It brings their temperature down, but not all at once. It’s a much better solution then simply dunking them into a cold bath. It doesn’t suppress the fever, either, not like those icky cold medicines. Fevers are good, you know, Wingdings.”

“Well aware, Your Majesty.”

“They help you fight off the bad germs. If you cram them down all the time, then how are they going to help? Now, a high fever, you want to get that down pretty quick—with medicine, if you have to—but a fever like his? No, he’ll be alright if you just give him a quick rub-down every few hours. You’re sure you don’t want me come over?”

“Quite sure. I think I can handle a single sick child on my own, but I’ll be sure to call you if anything changes.”

“Right, you’d better. And try not to get ill yourself, alright? Or I  _ will  _ be over there.”

“Noted,” Gaster says, a smile flickering across his mouth. “Get back to work, Asgore. We’ll be okay.”

He turns his attention back to Sans—who is sitting listlessly in his lap—and leans down to brush his teeth across his skull, a skeleton’s kiss. “Did you hear that?” he asks, and Sans hums absently at him. “The king himself has decreed that you’re going to be okay, so you have nothing to worry about.”

Sans sighs heavily, leaning his head against Gaster’s collarbone.

“You wanna try some more of the bottle for me?” Gaster asks, holding up the bottle. Sans chews on the nipple but doesn’t do anything more than that. “C’mon, Sans. You’ve gotta stay hydrated. Look—” Gaster (fuck pride, and fuck germs) sticks the bottle between his own teeth and drinks some of it. Sans giggles. “Just like that. Mmm. Tasty water, tasty.”

Sans obligingly drinks some of the water, then pushes it back at Gaster. 

“Oh—oh, no, I don’t need anymore. That’s very nice of you, though.”

Sans pushes harder. “Ba.”

“No, I don’t need ba. Ba’s for you.”

San’s lower jaw wobbles precariously, tears gleaming along the edges of his eyesockets.

“Okay, okay! Ba’s for me, it’s for me, look—” Gaster drinks from the bottle again, and is rewarded with more of his son’s giggles. He is so getting sick after this. They trade the bottle back and forth until the water’s gone, and Gaster (who had begun to only mime drinking the water) is pleased when Sans finishes most of it. He claps his hands, smiling at his son, who watches him with wide eyes. “Yay! Awesome job, Sans. I’m really proud of you.”

Sans beams at him, his eyes shining, and reaches for the bottle again. Hell yeah, positive reinforcement for the win.

Dr. Yeoman comes by shortly after lunchtime, greeting him cheerfully. She bustles around Sans with her medical bag, taking his temperature and examining his soul, and he sits listlessly and lets her. “Well, I think you’re right, doc,” she says, a few minutes later. “Just a little bug. If he can keep food and drink down, he’ll be okay. Just keep him warm and hydrated, and keep a close eye on that fever. If it gets over a hundred and four, take him to the clinic—but I think he should be fine. Won’t you, little cutie?” She boops Sans’ nose and he murmurs quietly at her.

“Well, nevertheless, thank you for the confirmation. I thought it was something small, but you can never be too sure.”

“Ah, spoken like a true new parent.” She pats his arm, then peels her pink gloves off and gathers her bag. “I’ll see you around, doc—but hopefully not anytime soon. We still on for those vaccines next month?”

“Definitely. I’ll see you then and not a minute sooner.”

“I’ll count on it.” She waves cheerfully at them both before slipping out the door. Gaster sighs in relief and collapses onto the couch beside Sans.

Later that afternoon, while Sans is napping and Gaster is planning out some future karyotyping, someone knocks at the door. Gaster jerks his head up, glancing at his bedroom door. Who in the world could that be? Asgore is his first guess, naturally, although he told the king he didn’t need help. He jogs downstairs, fully prepared to scold His Majesty for abandoning his royal duties so easily, and swings open the door.

_ Hello, Gaster,  _ Grillby signs with his free hand. His other hand is occupied by a large ceramic dish. Behind him stand at least five dogs, all armed with equally large dishes and tupperware containers.  _ We heard the little one was sick, so we brought you some dinner. _

“Ah—that’s very kind of you all,” Gaster says, scrambling to get out of the doorway. “Please, come in. I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure of meeting all of you.”

“Well, you know us,” Dogamy says, his tail wagging enthusiastically as the pack slips inside, wiping their paws on the welcome mat.

“Indeed you do,” Dogaressa agrees, touching Gaster’s shoulder fondly before depositing her dish onto the table. The rest of the dogs follow suit. “Grillby heard from Asgore that that poor pup of yours was ill, and we heard from Grillby, so we all decided to pitch in and do something nice.”

“That’s—really, it is very nice,” Gaster says. His cheeks feel warm. “You’re all very sweet. Thank you so much. I’m—ah, I’m Dr. Gaster.” He shakes hands (paws?) with the three dogs he doesn’t know. 

“Doggo,” the lean husky introduces himself. 

“I’m Lesser Dog,” a cream-colored shiba inu says, her tongue lolling happily. She points her muzzle at the white Samoyed next to her. “This is my cousin, Greater Dog. He doesn’t talk much. We’re the Canine Unit of the Royal Guard, so if you’re ever in trouble, just let us know and we’ll be there.”

“I’ll be sure to do that. It’s certainly very nice to meet you all.”

Greater Dog yaps his agreement, dancing from paw to paw with excitement.

_ So,  _ Grillby signs, touching Gaster’s back to get his attention.  _ How is the little one? _

“He’s—okay. He still doesn’t feel very well, but the doctor said it’s just a bug. He should be better in a few days.”

_ If you’re looking for tips and tricks, then I can tell you that whenever Fuku’s sick, I’ll light peppermint incense. It helps decrease nausea.  _

“Or you can try eating ginger,” Dogaressa suggests. “That always helps our pups. Although, ah—I suppose our pups have digestive systems.”

“Kibble with lots of cumin and fennel—that’s what our parents would make us when we were sick,” Lesser Dog says. 

“I’ll keep all of that in mind. I’m sure Sans will be grateful for anything that helps.”

Gaster endures a few more moments of small-talk before the canines mercifully head on their way. It isn’t that he doesn’t like them—he does!—but he truly just wants to be with Sans, right now. Perhaps that makes him ungrateful, or unsociable. He finds he doesn’t particularly care, at the moment. 

“I doubt Sans is going to be able to eat any of this,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck once the dogs are gone. 

_ No, probably not,  _ Grillby agrees.  _ But  _ you  _ will be. Go on. Eat something. _

“I really should get back to Sans—”

_ Would you like me to bring him down for you? I’ll take care not to wake him. _

“I—yes, if you would. Thank you.”

As Grillby heads upstairs, Gaster prepares himself a plate of meatloaf, mashed potatoes, and roasted green beans interspersed with—kibble? Yes. He’s fairly certain that’s kibble. Ah, well. His son ate dog food for the first eighteen months of his life. (Gaster doesn’t think he’ll ever get over that. He doesn’t suppose he should.) He takes a seat at the table, eating quickly. The kibble is crunchy, and a bit salty, but not bad.

Grillby comes downstairs a few moments later, Sans cradled in his arms. He sits next to Gaster, looking fondly at Sans’ face.  _ He’s got your nose. _

_ He’s got my everything. _

_ Everything, hm? He doesn’t look like his other parent even a little bit? _

Shit. Gaster grabs his glass of water to fill his hands while he thinks.  _ Not much,  _ he signs, finally. He peers at Sans, as though trying to find some resemblance to a non-existent second parent.  _ Perhaps—perhaps he has her cheeks. _

_ You know,  _ Grillby signs, his motions slow and soft,  _ if you ever want to talk about... _ her,  _ then I’m always here to listen. I understand what it’s like to lose someone you bore a child with, although perhaps not in the same way that you have. _

Oh, shit, way to make him feel worse. Gaster is a liar and he’s going to hell.  _ That’s—very kind of you, Grillby. Thank you. I think I’m alright now, though. _

_ Well, if you ever change your mind, the offer stands. Besides— _ He smiles warmly at Gaster, his flames flickering gentle and gold.  _ We single fathers have to stick together, don’t we? Let me know if you ever need anything. _

_ I will. And—you too, okay?  _

_ It’s a deal. Now, then—have you tried that apple cobbler yet? I was testing a new recipe. If you like it, perhaps I could include it in the menu at the bar. _

Grillby excuses himself after supper, and although Gaster’s sad to see him go, he’s also relieved to turn his full attention back to Sans. The baby is beginning to stir, scrunching up his face in blatant unhappiness. Gaster coos softly to him, scooping him up to pace the floor again. He prepares another bottle of water and electrolyte solution, offers it once Sans is awake, and has it savagely rejected. 

“How about a story, then?” he asks, settling back into bed with Sans, who is busily (and moodily) sucking his thumb. He cracks open one of Sans’ picture books, and Sans reaches out to touch the pictures with one slobbery hand. “This one is _The Giving Tree._ 'Once there was a tree, and she loved a little boy...'" Sans listens quietly as Gaster reads, occasionally reaching out to stroke his fingers over a glossy page and murmur something unintelligible. Every few minutes he’ll curl in on himself, coughing, and Gaster will pat his back and offer him the bottle of water. Sometimes Sans accepts it. Sometimes he doesn’t. Gaster feels that his cough has gotten bad enough it ought to be medicated, so as soon as they’ve finished the book, he goes to fetch a teaspoon of cherry-flavored cough syrup. 

“Here,” he says, offering the syrup to Sans on a familiar spoon. “This’ll make you feel better, bud.”

Sans chews noisily on his fingers, looking at Gaster like he’s lost his fucking mind.

“It will, really,” Gaster insists. If he can keep it down, anyway. “It’ll stop that coughing for you. It doesn’t taste the  _ best,  _ but it really isn’t too bad. See?” He mimes putting the spoon into his mouth as a demonstration, and Sans babbles at him. “You wanna try?”

“No,” Sans says, reaching for the spoon. Gaster...doesn’t think he quite knows what the word means, yet. 

Gaster helps Sans guide the spoon into his mouth. As soon as the flavor strikes him, Sans offers him a look of complete and utter betrayal and pushes the spoon away—but the damage is done, the cough syrup having been dissolved as soon as it entered Sans’ oral cavity. Sans wipes his hands across his teeth, whining, and readily drinks from the water bottle when Gaster offers it. After that ordeal, Gaster decides to try a few of the tricks his friends have suggested.

“Aaand under the covers we go,” he says, tucking Sans into the bed. Sans fusses, but he settles some when Gaster places a hand over his eyes and hushes him gently. Gaster wipes a cool washcloth along Sans’ limbs before snuggling them back underneath the blanket, and Sans coos softly at him. He lights some of the peppermint incense Grillby had offered him shortly before he left, and the smell quickly infuses the room. 

“Perhaps we can try some ginger tomorrow, if you feel like eating,” Gaster offers, sprawling out next to Sans. He rolls onto his side so he can face him, reaching out to rest a hand on his son’s ribcage. He brushes his thumb over the uneven ridges in his manubrium—Gaster’s bone, so carefully infused with his own. “I hope you feel better soon. I don’t like seeing you sick.”

Sans murmurs softly under his breath, reaching up to play gently with Gaster’s fingers. Gaster waits until he falls back asleep, then drags himself out of bed to shower and review his notes one last time. Once he’s finished that, he topples back into bed and curls up around his son to sleep. 

Sans is significantly better, the next day. He babbles more enthusiastically to Gaster, and although he still refuses breakfast, he  _ does  _ eat a few saltine crackers at lunchtime, and a whole quarter-cup of rice at dinnertime. He’s still not very active or interested in playing, but his nausea seems to have faded, and timely doses of cough syrup keep his cough at bay. He spends most of the day watching cartoons or napping while Gaster works on his reports and answers emails. He splashes in the bubbles at bathtime, and Gaster mounds some onto his skull until it looks like he’s wearing a little hat. Gaster laughs, and Sans look at him, amazed. 

That night, he allows Sans to fall asleep in his bed—he promises himself he’ll move him back to the crib tomorrow. He just wants to keep an eye on him for a  _ little  _ longer. They both fall asleep early in the evening, because Gaster’s feeling unusually weary. And then, somewhat predictably, at three in the morning Gaster wakes up and rushes to the bathroom to vomit. 

Ugh.

Luckily, he doesn’t wake Sans, so he spends a couple more peaceful hours huddled up next to the toilet. Sans wakes at the crack of dawn, and informs Gaster of his consciousness quite loudly, so Gaster peels himself away from the toilet and stumbles into the bedroom.

“Hey, buddy,” he mumbles, picking Sans up and patting his back. Sans hugs him around the neck, mouthing happily on his shoulder. “You want something to chew on, huh? I’ll get you one of those teething rings after breakfast, how’s that sound?”

He makes oatmeal for breakfast, and Sans eats it without fussing, thank the stars. Gaster, meanwhile, has to swallow bile at the thought of eating something himself. He sips a glass of water and offers Sans a bottle of full-cream milk. Sans gulps it down greedily, then turns his attention to the cold gel teething ring Gaster offers him. 

Gaster spends most of the day huddled in a blanket on the couch, watching Sans crawl around on the living room rug and play with (i.e. chew on) his blocks and squeaky toys. He takes a few trips to the bathroom to throw up way too much of his magic supply and then wallows around on the cold tile for a few minutes before returning to Sans. His cough starts shortly after dinner, and he groans and downs cough syrup right along with Sans.

Then, to his horror, someone knocks on the door.

Gaster considers simply ignoring it, but Sans chooses that moment to babble a wordless greeting at the door, so that plan is ruthlessly scrapped. He rolls off of the couch, sheds his blanket and straightens out his shirt, then goes to answer the door. 

“Wingdings!” Asgore greets him cheerfully, beaming. There’s a casserole dish in his arms. “I heard the little guy was feeling better, so I brought you some food for tomorrow. Hopefully he’ll be up to eating it then.”

“Yeah—yeah, um. Thanks.” He shuffles out of the doorway. “You can come in. I’m sure Sans’ll love it.”

Asgore leans towards him, sniffing suspiciously. “You smell sick.”

“Well, I have been around Sans all day.”

“Hmm.” Asgore pads into the kitchen, stuffing the casserole dish into the fridge amongst all the  _ other  _ casserole dishes. “Maybe that’s it. Wheeeere’s my little scamp, huh? Wheeeere’s he at? Oh! There he is!”

Sans squeals in delight when he sees Asgore, crawling towards him. Asgore scoops him up, nuzzling his face and cooing. “As!” Sans shrieks.  _ “As!” _

“That’s right, Uncle Asgore’s here,” Asgore croons, squeezing Sans close. Sans babbles in excitement, tugging earnestly at Asgore’s floppy ears. “How are we feeling, huh? Your daddy said you were getting aaaall better.”

“Da da da da,” Sans informs him, kicking his feet. 

“That’s right, your da-da said that.” 

Gaster slouches back onto the couch. “So is that all you came by for?” he asks.

“As a matter of fact, yes.” Asgore drops down beside him, bouncing Sans gently on his knee. “What? A guy can’t swing in to see how his friends are doing?”

“No, it’s—fine. Sorry. I don’t meant to be short.”

“That’s alright. Are you sure you’re feeling okay, though?” Asgore peers at him. “Your eyelights aren’t as bright as usual. What have you been wasting magic on this time?”

“‘m sick,” Gaster admits, heaving a sigh. “But it’s alright. It’s not that bad.”

“Wingdings.”

“Hmm?”

“No—listen. Look at me.”

Gaster glances warily at Asgore. The king looks back at him, his face unusually grave. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Parenting can be a terribly lonely thing. It’s—isolating, and exhausting, if you let it be. Your kids, they become your whole world. Taking care of them becomes all that matters, and you don’t even realize how much of yourself you’ve invested in them until—until they’re gone. And then you’re alone, and your life has no  _ meaning,  _ because your family meant everything to you, and there’s something noble in that, maybe, but—you can’t close everyone else out. Your friends want to help you, Wingdings. We’re here for Sans  _ and  _ for you.”

“I—I know,” Gaster says, his shoulders slumping.

“I know you do. I also know that it’s hard to remember, sometimes.” He rests a hand on Gaster’s skull. “Let me stay the night. I’ll take care of Sans while you recover.”

“I can’t ask that of you. You’ve already done so much—”

“—and I’ll continue to do as much as I need to. You’re my friend, Wingdings. One of the best. Besides, it’s really no hardship, since I get to hang out with this little fella all night.” He ruffles his paw across the top of Sans’ skull. “I’ll call and see if Alphys can come watch him tomorrow, okay?”

“You really don’t need to—”

“Wingdings. Raising a child is not a solitary task. It takes a village, right?”

“I suppose.” Gaster releases a weary breath, holding his head in his hands. “A village.”

“And you, my boy,” Asgore says, looking fondly at him, “have one of the best villages I’ve ever seen—so  _ use  _ it.”

“Right. I—I’ve been trying.”

“I know you have, and I appreciate that. So let’s just try a little more, okay?”

Gaster nods weakly, pulling his blanket around his shoulders. “Yeah. Okay.”

So Gaster goes to rest, and he lets his village watch his child while he can’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> listen listen i didn't write this chapter bc i was sick (i wrote it like,,,at least a month ago) but!! i ended up editing it while i was sick; funny how things line up like that. im gonna go,,,wallow in my illness now,,,
> 
> but first!! a fun fact!! other lullabies i considered having gaster sing were "mother earth and father time" (probably switched to father earth and mother time bc Time is a she in skeleculture), "la la lu" from lady n the tramp, or the classic "hush little baby," since gaster hasn't actually been sung any recent lullabies bc he hasnt been a kid for a long long time. (so technically i probably should've gone w "hush little baby" since "baby mine" wasn't written when he was a baby but let's just,,,ignore that fact,,,)


	7. little brothers aren't exactly cool

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: brief recreational alcohol use
> 
> “Although we know the end of the maze holds death (and it is something I have not always known—not long ago the adolescent in me thought death could happen only to other people), I see now that the path I choose through that maze makes me what I am.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

Teaching Sans to walk is...interesting. He’s so accustomed to being quadrupedal that he simply sees no reason to learn bipedal locomotion. He’ll stand, clutching Gaster or a nearby piece of furniture, but he won’t  _ walk.  _ He’s more than happy to crawl everywhere and into  _ everything.  _ Gaster is busy babyproofing things he didn’t ever think would need babyproofing—like the drawstrings for the curtains (Sans likes to chew on them and screams when he inevitably gets tangled), the edges of the tables (Sans has thunked his skull more than once on the corners), and the trash can (which Sans likes to dig in and undoubtedly eat out of).

By the time Sans is twenty-one months old (eleven, from ‘birth’), Gaster is determined to help him learn to walk. He starts by placing Sans at the far end of a room and sitting down across from him. “Now, Sans,” he says, using two magically-manifested hands to help his son stand. Sans clings tightly to the hands, giggling at them. “When you’re in this form, it’s ideal if you walk on two feet. It’s certainly more effective. Come here—” He opens his arms, and Sans stumbles eagerly in his direction, using the hands to keep himself upright.

“Da da da,” he says cheerfully, bouncing on his toes and releasing the hands once he’s near Gaster.

Gaster catches Sans in his arms, snuggling him close and clicking little skeleton kisses across his skull. “That’s right, Sans, good job! Very good job.” He offers Sans a tiny piece of frozen yogurt, which is readily scarfed down. (What can he say? His son is a very food-motivated individual and Gaster is not above taking advantage of that, despite the fact it still feels a little too much like  _ training  _ for his tastes.) 

He sets Sans back down, moving himself over to the opposite side of the room and offering Sans two manifested hands again. “Shall we try again?”

They try again—and again, and again, until Sans grows bored and turns to his blocks instead. Gaster lets him. Babies have extremely limited attention spans, after all, and Gaster doesn’t want to bore him or turn walking into a negative experience. They simply practice for a few minutes every day, and Sans gradually grows steadier and more confident.

Eventually, Gaster shifts to only offering Sans  _ one  _ manifested hand to balance himself with. Sans adapts readily, and leans less and less of his weight on the hand each time he toddles in Gaster’s direction. Pretty soon, Gaster has him releasing the hand to take a few steps on his own—though he always clings to the hand whenever his balance shifts.

“It’s harder walking on two feet,” Gaster explains one evening, propping his son on his hip as he prepares dinner. Sans pats his teeth as he talks, and Gaster takes care not to bite him. “Your center of gravity is higher up, and, naturally, two points of contact are less stable than four. But with two legs—as a primate-based skeleton, anyhow—your gate becomes more energy-efficient.”

“Gerufum,” Sans says, nodding solemnly and grabbing a fistful of cold green beans to shove at Gaster’s face.

Gaster recruits his friends more than once to try and help motivate Sans into walking. He arranges them in a circle, arms each with their own bag of frozen yogurt and chocolate chips, and then sets Sans in the middle. Sans looks at the circle of monsters, beaming and babbling happily at them. 

“Alright, buddy,” Gaster says, and Sans looks earnestly at him. He opens his arms, offers Sans a single manifested hand. “C’mere.”

Sans snags the hand above him and pulls himself up, then toddles to Gaster, who gives him his reward—a single chocolate chip. Sans takes it in one chubby baby fist, eyes wide, and crams it into his mouth. “Mmm,” he says. 

“Pretty good, huh? Alright.” He turns Sans around, pointing at Alphys. “Go to Dr. Alphys now.”

“Hi, S-Sans,” Alphys says, waving at him and holding up a yogurt piece. “You wanna come over here?”

Sans latches onto the manifested hand again, marching over to her with single-minded intent. He reaches for the yogurt, which Alphys gladly gives him.

“Good job,” she says, patting his head with good-natured awkwardness. “Y-you’re doing a lot better every time I see you.”

“My turn, my turn,” Asgore cheers, rattling his bag of goodies. Sans’ head whips around and he burbles in excitement, clinging to the manifested hand’s index finger and stumbling in Asgore’s direction. He grabs Asgore’s wrist once he reaches him, stretching a hand towards the bag. “Alright, alright, you little scamp, here’s your reward. Well done.”

Gaster quietly allows the manifested hand to vanish as Sans chows down on his chocolate chip. His son then turns expectantly towards Grillby.

_ Yes, it’s my turn now,  _ Grillby signs.  _ Though I’m afraid I don’t have yogurt or chocolate—I hope a drink of juice will suffice. Everything else melted.  _

Sans’ hands flicker uncertainly in front of his chest—an incomprehensible attempt at sign language, but one that warms Gaster’s heart anyhow—and then toddles towards Grillby. Gaster grins. So he  _ can  _ walk without the manifested hand, then. It’s just a matter of security. 

Gaster doesn’t re-manifest the hand, and Sans doesn’t appear to notice its absence as he toddles between them all, collecting his afternoon snack. He still tends to crawl quite a bit, after that, but he starts to walk if he wants to get somewhere quickly, or if they’re out in the snow. Gaster considers it a success, but a few days after Sans’ little breakthrough, he— _ changes,  _ again. 

It’s the first time Gaster has seen Sans change, and it’s every bit as horrifying as he imagined it. He has no idea what triggered it—they’d only been playing with a few toy cars when Sans had suddenly sat back, two circles of blue gleaming around his eyelights. Magic shivers through his bones, a sharp white pulse, and then everything begins to  _ shift.  _ Bones melt and reshape themselves, creaking and popping into new sockets, tearing right through Sans’  _ brand new onesie, hrgh— _

A few moments later, a blaster puppy stands in front of him again. Sans’ glow-irises fade, and his tail wags in excitement. Fortunately, he doesn’t appear to be hurt or exhausted by the change, though his eyelights  _ are  _ a little fainter, with the sudden expulsion of magic. Gaster goes to fix him a snack, and Sans sets about chewing his toy cars into shiny smithereens. Gaster isn’t concerned about choking, because, well—Sans has no throat, or trachea, or lungs. Whatever goes into his mouth, if it doesn’t magically dissolve, falls right out the back of his jaw. 

They go to Grillby’s for lunch that day, and Sans hops eagerly onto the bar, yapping cheerfully at Grillby. He’s certainly warmed up the other monster over the last couple of months, and he squirms happily as Grillby scoops him up and snuggles him.  _ Hello, Sans,  _ the elemental signs, and Sans tries desperately to mouth at his hands. The flames flicker out before he can.  _ I see we’re back to being a puppy today. Any particular reason why? _

Gaster shrugs helplessly. “I have literally no idea why. He just shifted while we were playing this morning.”

_ Maybe he got tired of walking on two legs. He is much more agile, this way. _

“Oh, you can say that again.” Gaster rubs his forehead. “He manages to get into even more things, and he’s certainly harder to catch. I had to chase him for ten minutes this morning, after he got one of his Legos stuck in his eyesocket. His eyesocket! I’ve still no idea how he managed it.”

_ The more mobile they are, the more trouble they get into.  _ Grillby’s flames flicker yellow with amusement. As if to prove him right, Sans squirms out of his arms and runs across the bar, stepping in not one but  _ three  _ different meals, to greet the Canine Unit. Gaster groans into his palms. “I am so sorry, Grillby, everyone, I’ll cover the food, I’ll—do you have a rag? I’ll help you clean up, and I’ll—I’ll—are you  _ laughing?” _

Grillby shakes his head like a  _ liar _ , burying his face in his hands as his flames crackle bright yellow. Several of the patrons follow suit, and Sans looks utterly enthralled with the noise. He hops off of Dogarressa’s lap to prance across the bar again, his head held high and his tail whipping a mile a minute. 

“Oh, you’re a little mischief-maker, aren’t you?” one of the patrons coos, and Sans chuffs in agreement. 

“Puppies,” Dogamy says, grinning. “They get into everything, Dr. Gaster. Don’t worry. We’ve all been there.”

Lesser Dog slides down from her seat, dropping into a playbow and barking at Sans. Sans’ eyes widen, and he looks towards Gaster.

“Well, go on,” Gaster says, scooping him up and setting him on the floor after cleaning his paws off. “Go play while Dad cleans up your mess.”

Sans scrambles over to Lesser Dog, playbowing back at her. The two of them race outside, barking in delight, and Gaster turns back to Grillby.

“I—really am sorry about that,” he says, gathering up the dishes. “He didn’t mean to—”

_ Gaster, I know,  _ Grillby signs, taking the plates from him and carrying them into the back room before returning with a rag.  _ It’s alright, really. I’ve had adults who have made far, far worse messes.  _ He turns to the three patrons whose meals Sans had so ruthlessly squashed.  _ Can I get you three replacement meals? _

“Oh, no, that’s alright. We were almost finished, anyhow,” one of them says, chuckling. “It’s no problem at all.”

“Please, let me pay for them,” Gaster says, fumbling for his wallet.

“No, no, really. That’s alright, we—”

_ “Take my money.” _

The three take Gaster’s money and then make a hasty retreat. Gaster scrubs splattered food off of the bar and stools, then sighs and hands the rag back to Grillby with a grimace.

_ Honestly, Gaster. There’s no need to feel so bad,  _ Grillby signs.  _ He’s a kid. Making messes is at least 90% of their life goals. Although—I did have something I wanted to discuss with you. _

Gaster’s head jerks up. “Yes?”

_ Fuku has been very excited to meet Sans. Would you like to schedule a playdate sometime soon?  _

“Oh—oh, certainly. I’d love for Sans to have friends closer to his age. How old is she now, anyway? Eight?”

_ She turned nine this last November.  _

“Wow. Ha. I remember the day she was born.” Gaster rubs the back of his neck. “Where’s the time go?”

_ It goes faster than you can imagine. They grow up so quickly. _

“Yeah. They do. Damn. I remember when Sans was just—” Just a little zygote, smaller than a speck of dust. Just some notes, some theories, a distant hope. “—an infant.”

_ How old is he now? _

“Eleven months and three weeks.”

_ He should have a birthday coming up soon, then. _

“Yes. On—” He pauses, fumbling to do some quick math in his head. Ten months after October 15th, that would make it, give or take a few days—“August 15th.” 

_ Are you having a party for him? _

Gaster cocks his head. “I—hadn’t thought about it yet. I suppose I will. You’re invited, of course, you and Fuku. I’ll have to let you know the details closer to time. I—”

Sans bursts back into the bar, Lesser Dog close on his heels. “Da!” he shrieks joyfully, plunging into Gaster’s legs. Gaster stumbles back, and Lesser Dog skids to a stop in front of him, her tail wagging. 

“You got a cool kid there, Dr. Gaster,” Lesser Dog says, her eyes shining. “Anytime he wants to come play with the pack, he’s welcome.”

Sans squirms away from Gaster, jumping up to bite beneath Lesser Dog’s chin. She swings her head away from him, pulling her lips back to reveal a quick sliver of her teeth, and Sans obediently settles down. 

“I’m glad to hear it,” Gaster says, crouching and opening his arms. Sans scrambles into them, nuzzling his jaw. 

That night, back at the house, Gaster hears the Canine Unit begin to howl. He’s heard it every night, of course—they always get together at the shift change and scream at the cavern ceiling to warn off potential threats. Gaster’s...not really sure how effective it is. This time, however, Sans’ head jerks up off of the couch, his eyes widening.

“What?” Gaster asks. “It’s just the pack, bud.”

Sans jumps off of the couch and races to the window, springing onto the table so he can see out of it. He listens breathlessly for a moment, his tail wagging slowly, as the howls rise and fall. Then he throws his own head back and answers their howls with one of his own. It isn’t like the howling he uses at night to get Gaster’s attention—no, this howl is long and low and eerie, made to carry over miles.

Gaster opens the window for him, and he howls again. In the distance, the pack falls silent. Then, one by one, they raise their voices in chorus again. Dogaressa’s howl, warm and full, intertwined closely with Dogamy’s, rich and deep. Doggo’s howl is sharper, more piercing. Greater and Lesser sound similar enough that Gaster can’t quite tell which one is which. It’s a noisy affair, but worth it, Gaster thinks, when he sees Sans’ tail wagging wildly, his front paws dancing on the windowsill as he howls along with the pack. He looks expectantly at Gaster.

“No,” Gaster says, holding his hands up. “No no no. Dad isn’t a dog. He doesn’t howl.”

“Arow row  _ row!” _

“No, I really—it’s just screaming, for me. You don’t want that. Nobody wants that.”

But Sans gives him the puppy-dog eyes, and he is weak. He cracks the door open, and follows Sans out into the street. Then he summons his magic, pools it into that familiar, ancient shape, and forms the full skeleton of an adult blaster. It stands panting in the street, breath curling like white smoke around its massive muzzle, its tail wagging slowly. Sans gapes. 

“Da?”

“Yeah, that’s Daddy’s blaster.” Gaster crouches next to Sans, resting a comforting hand on his skull. “He’s not scary, don’t worry. Look—he likes you.” He guides his magic, and the blaster responds. It pads closer to them, crouching in front of Sans and offering a doggy smile. Its tail thumps noisily on the snow. Sans hides behind Gaster’s legs. 

“Da,” he says accusingly. “No.”

“What, you don’t like it?”

“Vvvvvv.”

Gaster guides his blaster to roll over, legs splaying in the air. Evidently, this show of not-a-threat is enough to coax Sans out. He leans forward, touching his muzzle to the adult blaster’s before jerking back and watching it warily. The blaster croons softly at him, eyesockets closing, and Sans’ tail slowly begins to wag again. He paces around the blaster, sniffing curiously at it, then springs back and, his eyes shining, howls up at the cavern ceiling again. 

At Gaster’s command, the blaster stands and braces its front paws in the snow. It leans its head back, angles its muzzle up, and howls along. The sound starts as a subsonic rumble in the pit of its chest, then quickly graduates into a massive, bone-shaking noise that has both his  _ and  _ Sans’ eyes flying wide. Oops. That was probably definitely too loud for a residential neighborhood. Across town, the Canine Unit falls utterly, completely silent. The neighbors’ lights flick on.

“Ahaha, okay, let’s go back inside now, Sans,” he says. He snaps his fingers and the blaster dissipates. The two of them race back inside, and Gaster slams the door shut, slumping against it. Sans laughs at him, mouth open and happy, and Gaster can’t help but laugh along.

A few minutes later, he hears paws crunching on the snow outside. If he looks closely, he sees the gleam of light reflecting from tapeta lucida—a shimmer of green and yellow irises, and the sound of happy panting. He rubs the back of his neck sheepishly, pulls on his overcoat, and goes to answer the pack’s questions.

* * *

Sans’ first birthday party is a quiet affair. Gaster drops him off with Grillby while he decorates their house with Asgore. They hang glittery streamers, paste up pictures of rockets and stars, and blow up blue and silver balloons. Gaster hadn’t been confident enough in his baking abilities to make food himself, so Asgore directed him to one of the capital’s top chefs. As a result, he has an adorable rocket-shaped cake iced in red and blue, along with star-shaped cookies and red fruit punch inaccurately dubbed ‘rocket fuel.’ Once the decorations are complete and the guests have arrived, Gaster calls Grillby to escort Sans home.

A few minutes later, Sans trots into the house in front of Grillby, then freezes when he sees the decorated living room. His tail drops nervously, until Gaster crouches in front of him and smiles. “Hey there, birthday boy. Welcome home.” 

“Da!” Sans races towards him, and Gaster scoops him up, snuggling him close. 

“Happy birthday, Sans,” Gaster says, clicking his teeth against Sans’ skull. “This is your party. Do you like it?”

Sans points a paw enthusiastically at the streamers. “Look!”

“Yes, I see. Those are streamers. We do  _ not  _ eat those.”

“Look!”

“Mm-hm. Those are balloons. They make a loud noise if you pop them.”

“Look, Da!”

“Oh, come now, you know what that is. That’s an Uncle Asgore.”

Sans gets passed around to be snuggled, as per usual, and he squirms and giggles and laps up the attention. Once Alphys sets him on the ground, he takes off to play with Fuku and Greater Dog. They run around the house, squealing and shouting and barking, and Gaster tries very hard not to trip over them. He only fails once. 

Sans has  _ some  _ trouble figuring out how to blow out the candles on his cake, but after a few minutes of coaxing, he gets it done. He looks thrilled at the applause he gets when he does—and he’s even more thrilled when he gets to  _ eat  _ the cake. Usually Gaster tries not to let him have too many sweets, lest he rot his growing bones, but this is clearly an exception. He even fills a small bowl with ‘rocket fuel’ and offers it to Sans, who immediately chugs it and then whines for more.

After refreshments, Gaster scrubs icing off of Sans’ bones, then releases him. He bolts off, followed closely by Fuku. The sugar rush keeps them going for another half-hour, and then Sans begins to crash. Gaster seizes the opportunity to carry him over to his presents—an act which reinvigorates him after he realizes he gets to tear the shiny paper with his teeth and claws. Several of the presents are simply functional—new sippy cups, bibs, or clothes (both bipedal and quadrupedal). A few of them are toys, which are the ones Sans immediately latches onto. He gets new blocks (the others were mercilessly chewed to death), a glow-in-the-dark bouncy ball (angel have mercy on everything breakable), and shiny new crayons (there go Gaster’s pristine walls). 

Sans is utterly exhausted, after that. He lounges around in Gaster’s arms as they say their goodbyes to their guests, and he’s asleep as soon as Gaster settles him into his crib. Gaster turns to leave—he’s got a shit-ton of cleaning up to do—but pauses in the doorway. He’s been meaning to get a bone sample from Sans, for DNA testing (to figure out how the  _ actual fuck  _ he became a shapeshifter), and now seems like as good a time as any. He fetches his supplies.

Gathering the DNA sample is a simple, painless procedure. He gently lifts one of Sans’ arms and, using a sharp scalpel, scrapes off some of the outer bone tissue of his ulna. He collects the tissue in a sterile vial, caps it, and places it into his interdimensional box for his next trip to the lab. Sans doesn’t even stir, and when Gaster scans his soul, his HP stands unwaveringly at 5. (He’s gotten more powerful in the last few months, and Gaster is glad to see it, although it means his own AT and DF have slowly dropped.) 

The next day, he drops Sans off with Grillby and rides with the Riverperson to Hotland. “Tra la la—take care when you snoop beneath people’s houses. It’s not safe there.”

“Noted,” Gaster says. 

Once he reaches the lab, he prepares a quick karyotype of Sans’ chromosomes. (He thinks he might hang the resulting picture in Sans’ bedroom. It’s scientifically  _ and  _ aesthetically interesting.) Sans, like most skeletons, possesses fifty-three lovely paired chromosomes, along with two X chromosomes and a Y chromosome. Once he’s got the karyotype, he decides to do some gel electrophoresis to see exactly  _ what  _ proteins Sans’ blaster form is activating. 

When the gel is prepped and running, he returns to his office and goes about the exhausting process of answering emails. On his lunch break, he makes a quick run to the cafeteria, calls Grillby to check up on Sans, and browses one of the parenting books Asgore lent him. The rest of his day is spent working on the Core, until the timer for the gel goes off. He springs to his feet, eager to analyze the results. 

As it turns out, his original hypothesis was right—several of blaster phenotype marker proteins are present, and none of the skeleton phenotype markers are. He’ll have to look at a sample from Sans while he’s in his skeleton form to get a better picture, but it appears he’s definitely activating and deactivating certain phenotype genes using his magic. Of course, that’s about the  _ only  _ thing he can do with magic, right now. 

* * *

Each year on Halloween, Grillby hosts a monster mash. Gaster’s only been a few times in the last few decades, but he can’t turn down the opportunity to take Sans. It  _ is  _ his first real Halloween, after all. Alphys squeals when Gaster tells her their Halloween plans, and he can’t turn her down when she offers to design their costumes.

“I mean, it’s basically cosplay,” she says, scurrying around him that afternoon. “I, p-personally, think you would make a  _ great  _ werewolf.”

Gaster arches a bonebrow at her.

“W-what?” she says, setting her hands on her hips. “It’s true. T-trust the expert.”

Gaster trusts the expert. She dresses him in jeans and a red plaid button-up (why werewolves have to wear red plaid, he doesn’t know) and a brown jacket with a hood styled after a wolf’s head. She also fastens a fluffy brown tail to the back belt loop of his jeans, then stands back, beaming. The costume is more absurd than it is frightening, but if it makes her happy—well, who is Gaster to complain?

“It’s perfect, Dr. Alphys,” he says, and she clasps her hands in front of her and bounces.

“Aw,” she says, her cheeks pink. “T-thank you. I’m glad you think so. Now, what is  _ this  _ little guy gonna wear?”

She crouches and pats Sans’ skull, and he pants happily at her, his tail whapping against the ground. 

“Scratch under his chin,” Gaster advises.

Alphys scratches under Sans’ chin. He sits, his eyes squeezing shut and his hind leg beginning to thud happily against the floor.  _ Thump, thump, thump, thump. _

“Oh my god,” Alphys says. “Thumper.”

So Sans is dressed as a tiny rabbit from one of Alphys’ human movies—a cartoon called  _ Bambi.  _ She tapes a pair of bunny ears to his skull, zips a gray hoodie into place, and sticks a white cottontail at the base of his tail. Sans immediately chews it off, but at least Gaster got a good picture first. Asgore arrives later that evening, and Alphys adds the final touches to his vampire costume. 

“Muahahaha,” he says, holding his cape up and waggling his eyebrows at Gaster. “How cool am I?”

“Very cool,” Gaster says. Sans sniffs warily at the cape, then sneezes his agreement. 

Alphys herself goes as a mad scientist—classic. She splatters one of her old lab coats with paint, rubs charcoal along the sides of her safety goggles, and snaps on black nitrile gloves. She also carries a beaker full of lime soda; bubbly  _ and  _ bright. (Gaster will catch her sipping on it, later that night.) 

Once they’re all dressed, Gaster scoops Sans up, and the four of them head to Grillby’s. The doors are propped open, allowing a stream of festively-costumed monsters to trek in and out of the bar at will. Music ebbs out over the street, loud enough that Gaster can feel the pulse of it in his feet when he steps into the bar. Asgore is immediately whisked away by the dogs, who are ecstatic at the chance to speak with their king. (The dogs are all dressed as cats.)

Alphys tags along behind Gaster, who weaves his way towards the bar. Grillby, Gaster has to admit, looks pretty damn good. He’s dressed in a pitch black suit with an orange bowtie; on his head, there’s a Jack-o-lantern. His flames flicker merrily out of the eyes and mouth as he serves a drink full of fizzing pumpkin candies. Gaster is almost certain that the old, beaten black scabbard strapped to Grillby’s hip houses the sword he used in the war. 

Sans gapes at him. “No,” he decides.

_ Hello, Gaster, Sans, Dr. Alphys,  _ he signs.  _ I’m glad you could make it. _

“Hello, Grillby.” Gaster takes a seat at the bar, setting Sans in his lap. Alphys climbs onto the stool next to him, waving shyly. 

“Hi, Mr. Grillby. It’s b-been a while. Um—” She points at his costume. “H-Headless Horseman, right?”

_ Quite correct.  _ Grillby whisks his Jack-o-lantern off of his head, pulling his flames back into the collar of his suit; he looks, for all intents and purposes, headless.  _ Do you like— _

Sans shrieks and bursts into tears.

As Gaster fumbles to convince his son that their dear friend  _ hasn’t  _ actually just died, Grillby rushes to resurge his flames. Gaster shoves Sans at him, and Grillby scoops the pup up, allowing him to bawl against his pristinely-ironed suit lapels. 

_ He hates it,  _ Grillby signs miserably with a single hand. He cradles Sans to his chest with the other, bouncing him gently. 

“No, no, I’m sure he...loves it,” Gaster says, eyeing his son uncertainly. Sans one-hundred percent hates it. “It just startled him, that’s all.”

_ Ah, I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry, Sans.  _ He crackles soothingly, petting the back of Sans’ skull until his sobs fade into miserable sniffles.  _ I assure you, I still have a head—not that I particularly need one. _

Grillby carries Sans most of the night—mostly because Sans screams if anyone tries to take him away. In the meantime, Gaster gets his socializing out of the way, then spends his evening munching candy and sipping on a cocktail that glows suspiciously bright purple. Grillby makes it a point to never let his glass run dry, and Gaster is more than a little tipsy after a couple of hours. His fingers feel tingly, and his cheeks are warm. He’s happy. He’s so damn happy and everything is so nice. Even chatting with the other patrons isn’t as intimidating as usual. 

Sans falls asleep around eight, and Gaster manages to take him back from Grillby. He cradles him carefully against his chest, humming along to the music; it’s softer, now, as the night winds down. He pushes his cocktail glass away—as good as it was, he doesn’t need to be nursing a hangover with a baby in the house. 

“I t-think I’m gonna head out,” Alphys says, patting Gaster’s shoulder. Her beaker is empty, now. “Thanks for inviting me, though. I had a lot of fun.” She leans over, touching Sans’ skull with one painted claw. “S-sleep well, little guy. I’ll see you later.”

Asgore, too, takes his leave shortly after ten. The other patrons trickle out into the darkness, giggling giddily amongst themselves. Several have bags full of candy or hands smeared with chocolate and sugar. Gaster stays until the bar is nearly empty (and the streets less crowded with trick-or-treaters) before rising to say his goodbyes to Grillby. Grillby’s arms have been filled by yet another child—Fuku snoozes against his chest, her witch’s hat lopsided. 

“Have a g’night, Grillby,” Gaster says, offering him a muzzy smile.

_ I’ll do my best. See you tomorrow for lunch? _

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.” And then, because he’s drunk and full of sugar, he adds, “You’re the best, you know that, right?”

Grillby flickers pink.  _ Oh, go home, Gaster. You’re drunk. _

“Noooo—well, yes, but really,” he says. “You’re, like, super cool. I really like your costume. You should—have you seen _Ghost Rider?_ That’s—we could do like, a—a team costume. We would be really good at that. One year maybe.”

_ Do I need to walk you home? _

“‘m fine, I’ve got a baby.” He laughs. “Oh stars, Grillby, I’ve got a baby.”

So Grillby walks him home. They both carry their children bundled against their chests, and Gaster’s soul is warm and full. Life is sweet. So is the candy he hoards in his pockets.

* * *

Gyftmas comes and goes, as do Thanksgiving and the New Year. Gaster spends most of his holidays with Grillby, Asgore, and Alphys, sharing food and drink and companionship. Sans begins to adore leaving the house—they always go somewhere exciting, with presents or snow or good food. There’s nothing for him to fear, out there, and Gaster plans to keep it that way. Sans grows in leaps and bounds, and before Gaster knows it, another year has passed. He marks Sans’ height (in both forms) on the doorframe in glittery blue Sharpie. It doesn’t seem possible, but Grillby was right—Time moves faster, with a child. Gaster, for the first time, begins willing her to slow down.

Sans’ second birthday party is ocean-themed. It’s hosted in Waterfall, so they can swim in the river where it’s not frigid. Gaster and Asgore, now obviously decorators extraordinaire, feston the riverside with blue and yellow balloons, a banner with turtles all over it, and tables full of sea-themed treats. Sans adores being in the water—perhaps some deeply-rooted affection for being immersed, since he was raised in solution—and Gaster does his best to teach him to swim.

“So you kick your legs—yes, that’s it, kick kick kick,” he encourages, and Sans paddles all four paws furiously as Gaster keeps a careful hand under his chest to help him stay afloat. His head dips under the water and he comes back up, grinning and shaking droplets off of his snout. “Do you like it?”

“Uh-huh,” Sans says, his eyes shining. He ducks his head under again, blowing bubbles. “Leggo.” He pushes at Gaster’s hand with a hind paw. “Go.”

“Are you sure?”

“Uh-huh.”

Gaster carefully removes his hand, although he keeps six other magically-manifested hands at the ready around Sans, hidden beneath the water. Sans paddles vigorously in the shallows, his tail wobbling behind him as he moves through the water. “There you go, you’re doing it,” Gaster says, walking alongside him—the water here barely comes up to the hem of his swimming trunks. “Look at you. You learn fast, huh?”

Sans beams. “Yes.”

“You think you can get all the way over to Asgore?”

Sans rumbles his agreement, swimming slowly towards Asgore, who is lounging on the riverside. “Hey there, scamp,” Asgore says, grinning at him. “Wow, already swimming by yourself? You’re a natural.”

Asgore hauls the pup out of the water, and Sans flops onto the warm pebbles beside him, panting. A second later, Doggo sloshes out of the river behind him, giving himself a rough shake and splattering them all with water. “Brrr,” he says. “It sure is chilly, comin’ out of that water.”

“What, really?” Asgore arches an eyebrow. “I thought you lived in Snowdin.”

“Yes, well, I’m usually  _ dry  _ in Snowdin, Your Majesty.”

“Sans!” Fuku shouts, waving at him to get his attention. _C’mere. Do you want some jello?_

Sans clambers to his paws, tail wagging, but Asgore catches him before he can trot off. “Wait just a minute there, fella. You need to dry off first. Fuku won’t like that water on her. Maybe your daddy’s got your towel?”

“Right here,” Gaster says, stepping out of the river and grabbing Sans’ towel. He wipes him down with it, and Asgore releases him to bound over to Fuku. The two of them begin plundering the snack table, and Gaster takes a seat next to the king. “They seem to be having fun.”

“Indeed they do,” Asgore agrees. “I don’t think Sans is going to need those floaties anytime soon.”

Gaster chuckles. “No, it doesn’t look like it. Ah, well. We’ll keep them for a while. You never know when you might need a pair of floaties.”

“What?” Asgore arches an eyebrow at him, smirking. “Planning on having another pup around, are we?”

Gaster balks. “Oh, no. No no no no. Absolutely not, never ever, you shut your heathen mouth.”

Asgore holds up his hands in surrender, laughing. “Alright, alright. I’m just saying, if you like this parenting thing, you could always adopt—”

“No, Sans is quite enough, thank you. I—”

“Hey there, strangers,” an unfamiliar voice says, and Gaster’s head snaps around. A pair of monsters stride across the riverbank. One of them (the speaker, it appears) is bulky, made of blue scales and rippling muscle. The other is smaller, covered in sleek auburn fur. Her face reminds Gaster distinctly of an otter, as does her tail.

“Hello,” Asgore says, and the fish monster does a double-take. 

“Woah, hold up, you’re no stranger,” she says, crouching and offering a webbed hand to Asgore, who shakes it amiably. “I mean, we’ve never met personally, but who doesn’t know you, heh? I’m Ipera, and this is my wife, Mello.”

“A pleasure to meet you both,” Asgore says, smiling. “I’m Asgore, and this is my friend, Dr. Gaster.”

“Hello,” Gaster says, shaking both of their hands. 

“We were just out for a stroll when we noticed the hubbub over here,” Ipera says, scratching behind a bright green ear-fin. “We thought we’d drop in and see what it was about, introduce ourselves. So—birthday party, huh? Who’s the lucky champ?”

“The little skeleton pup over there,” Asgore says, gesturing towards Sans, who—good lord—is currently covered in blue jello and brown sugar. “His name is Sans. He’s two today.”

“Ah, the terrible twos. Who are the unlucky parents?”

“I’m his father,” Gaster says, raising a hand sheepishly. “It’s not— _ that  _ bad, right?”

Ipera throws her head back and cackles.

“Well,” Mello says reasonably. “You’ve already made it through one year, so you’ve got some experience. Now you just have to use that experience to  _ crush the twos and threes out of your memory.”  _ She bares her teeth, miming the act of crushing something ruthlessly with her little otter hands.

“Right,” Gaster whispers.

“Come on, now, it’s not that bad,” Asgore says, patting his back. “Asriel was an  _ angel  _ when he was two.”

“Manti was a demon,” Mello says. “Just awful. He would bite, and kick, and throw tantrums at least five times a day.”

“He got it from his mother,” Ipera says, hooking a thumb at Mello.

“Quite right,” Mello agrees, smiling sweetly. 

“Well, I suppose we’d best be on our way, though. We don’t mean to crash your party.”

Asgore looks meaningfully at Gaster, who clears his throat and says, “Ah—no, no, by all means, you can stay, if you’d like to. The more the merrier, and we have a metric ton of cake to get rid of, so—”

Mello and Ipera stay. They both plunge into the river, and Sans follows them in a few minutes later, yapping with excitement. Lesser Dog and Dogamy both follow suit, splashing enthusiastically. Gaster keeps a careful eye on his son—the adults don’t mean to be rough, of course, but Sans is so little that he can’t help but worry. Mello somehow weasels Dogamy into fighting her (she’s winning), while Ipera takes to helping Sans swim a little farther downstream. 

“Hey there, puppy, you’re pretty good at this already,” she says, grinning and gently splashing Sans as he paddles around her. She creates gentle waves for him to swim through, and he tries his best to wag his tail through the water. 

By the time cake and presents are done, Sans is more than happy to sprawl out in Gaster’s lap and snooze. Asgore and Alphys both volunteer to clean up for him, so he doesn’t have to move, and Gaster gratefully takes them up on the offer. Grillby takes a seat beside him—Fuku is asleep too, slumped against his chest, her flames flickering pale green in her weariness.

_ They played hard today,  _ Grillby signs.

“That they did,” Gaster agrees. “I think they enjoyed it, though.”

_ Oh, certainly. Fuku is very fond of Sans, you know.  _

“I’m glad. He really likes getting to see her. I worry that she’ll get—annoyed with him, once she’s older. I know my brothers never wanted to hang out with me, once they were teenagers, although I can’t say I blame them.”

_ Really? _

“Yeah. I mean, little brothers aren’t exactly cool. I’ve never met a big brother who thought so, anyway.”

Sans stirs in his lap, and Gaster sets a careful hand on his skull. 

_ Well, I think your brothers must have been rather silly.  _

“How so?”

_ Because you, Gaster, are very cool. _

Gaster ducks his head. “Ah—that’s very kind of you to say.”

_ In any case, even if Fuku  _ does  _ become annoyed with him, I’m sure she’ll always see him as a friend. Once they’re both adults, the age gap won’t make much of a difference, anyhow. They’re only eight years apart. _

“Yes. You’re probably right.”

_ I know I am. _

“And so humble, too.”

_ I didn’t survive the war to be humble. _

“That’s okay. It’s good to be proud of who you are, I think.” He knocks his knee against Grillby’s. “Anyway, I admire it.”

Grillby crackles pink at the edges.

As Gaster says his goodbyes to his guests, Sans cradled carefully in his arms, Alphys pulls him aside. “S-so,” she says. “I heard a rumor from Asgore that you might be having another pup?”

“What?!” 

Alphys jumps. “Ah! S-sorry, is that not—is it, um—”

“No, I’m sorry, I just—” He rubs his forehead and Sans whines sleepily at him. “I’ve no idea why he put it that way.”

“W-well, he didn’t say it  _ exactly  _ that way, but I may have, um, o-overheard him teasing you about it—would it even be possible to make a-another one?”

“I mean—yes, it’s  _ possible,  _ but it would be extremely irresponsible. I could create the physical form, but I couldn’t sustain another soul. Sans is taking everything I have, and that’s—okay, I want him to, but I couldn’t handle creating another soul. It would kill me. Well.” He grimaces. “Faster than it already is, anyway. I couldn’t keep my own form stable if my magic were drained any faster.”

Alphys falls silent, dropping her gaze.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that,” he says. “It’s best if we don’t think about it.”

“No, no, it’s—I’m g-glad you’re coming to terms with it. With, um. Dying. I just don’t particularly enjoy the t-thought.”

“That makes two of us.”

“I’m sorry I asked about the pup. I don’t think it w-would be good if any more were made.”

“No,” Gaster agrees. “Not good at all.”

But he—wonders, as he carries Sans home. A dangerous thing, wondering. Fortunately, he’s able to clip his thoughts before they grow too unwieldy. A second blaster? A second  _ son?  _ Absolutely not. Really, who needs  _ two  _ children? One will do just fine. Dr. W.D. Gaster is not going to have two sons. Nope. Not happening. Never ever ever. 

It’s silly to even think.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yes hullo here is your weekly dose of domestic fluff and foreshadowing i hope u enjoyed it
> 
> fun fact: uuuuh—oh!! here’s one!! if you haven’t picked up on it yet, grillby’s deaf. he can speak with his magic, but he chooses not to, because he can’t hear himself and he doesn’t like it. his deafness is caused by a genetic mutation, but it wasn’t a mutation that his late wife carried, so fuku is hearing. however, she chooses to sign most of the time because that’s what she’s grown up around and most monsters speak Hands pretty fluently anyway. it is safe to assume that anyone talkin to grillbz is signing along with their words. he’s pretty good at lip-reading, but for monsters without lips, you can imagine that that gets a little tricky. that’s how come him and gaster are such old friends! back in the day, before Hands was in most monster school curriculum, they bonded over the fact that neither one of them could communicate easily with others. (they were both influential in convincing asgore to pass a law for Hands to be taught in schools, alongside Common, bc a significant number of monsters lack the physical ability and/or magical prowess to communicate verbally.)


	8. the spirit of carrying on

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: blood, injury, violence, mentions of death, references to corporeal punishment, mentions of enslavement/unethical experimentation
> 
> “There are so many doors to open. I am impatient to begin.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

The day Sans learns to use magic is utterly, completely, inexcusably awful. It starts well enough, as so many awful days do. Gaster wakes up, stretches, and rolls out of bed to make breakfast: chocolate chip pancakes and sausage. Just as he’s finishing one pancake (in the shape of a smiley face, because Sans laughs when he sees that), he hears little footsteps on the carpet upstairs. 

“Da!”

“Good morning, Sans,” he says, wiping his hands off on his apron and turning to look at the second floor. Sans leans against the baby gate at the top of the stairs, and he thrusts his arms up expectantly. Gaster goes to retrieve him, scooping him up and propping him on his hip as he returns to the kitchen. “We’re having pancakes for breakfast—would you like that?”

“Mmm.”

“Yes, I thought you might.”

_Eat,_ Sans signs, touching his fingertips to his teeth. 

_Precisely what we’re going to do,_ Gaster signs back, sliding the pancake onto a small plate. He drizzles it with syrup, then sets Sans in his highchair and places the plate in front of him. He feeds Sans (the child still isn’t old enough to be trusted alone with a fork, let alone when it involves eating something this sticky) before releasing him and preparing his own breakfast. Sans runs to the living room to play, grabbing his bouncy ball. 

Once breakfast is over and the dishes have been cleared away, Gaster joins his son in the living room. He takes a seat on the couch, pulling his reports from his interdimensional box to begin work. The background noise of his son, babbling and playing, used to distract him—now he finds it a pleasant backdrop, similar to the jazz he listens to in his office. Even so, he only gets a few minutes of work in before Sans climbs into his lap and all over his papers.

“Hey, kid, you’re interfering with the Royal Scientist’s work,” he teases, tugging his papers out from under Sans’ knees and setting them aside. “That could be considered a criminal charge.”

“‘kay,” Sans says, leaning forward to bonk his head against Gaster’s. Gaster grumbles playfully, sweeping Sans into his arms before rolling off of the couch. Sans squeals with delight, flapping his arms, and Gaster sits up and noogies him gently. Laughing, Sans squirms out of his arms, then turns around and jumps at him again. Gaster topples over as dramatically as he can, draping an arm over his forehead.

“Oh, you’ve bested me, foul fiend—however will I recover from this mortal blow?”

Sans jumps onto his ribcage and Gaster spends the next few minutes wheezing in regret. His son offers him a chewed-up block in apology, and he accepts it, once his sternum has stopped aching. He then spends the next few minutes play-wrestling with his child, until Sans is weary enough to settle down on the couch and watch cartoons as Gaster works.

It’s early afternoon when the Canine Unit begins to howl.

Sans’ head snaps up, and he shouts in delight, running to the window. He’s more than capable of howling, even in his non-blaster form (his voice is, after all, simply magic—it has nothing to do with his physical structure), so howl he does. But there’s something—different, this time, and evidently he picks up on it. He falls silent, cocking his head.

“That’s odd, isn’t it?” Gaster asks, frowning. The dogs don’t often howl this early in the day, and when they _do,_ it doesn’t sound like this. It usually sounds happy and excited, but there’s something raw and harried in the noise today. “I do hope they’re alright.”

Sans whines, pushing up on his toes to see more. “Dogs?”

“Yes, those are the dogs. I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about.” A wry smile flickers across his face. “Perhaps they’ve found a rabbit to chase.”

That’s when the sirens go off.

The sirens were the previous Royal Scientist’s work—a system of enormous speakers running through each town, equipped with the ability to wail so loudly that any monster in the Underground can hear. Their alarms are terrible, fluctuating noises that make Gaster’s skull ring. Sans jumps and yelps, stumbling away from the window with wide eyes. 

“Sans, come here.” Gaster bolts to his feet, scooping his child up, because those sirens are for one thing and one thing only: a human is in the Underground. Sans’ breath hitches when he sees Gaster’s fear, tears already pooling in his eyes. “It’s alright, shhh, hey, it’s alright. Nothing to be worried about. We’re just going to go to the basement for a little while, okay? Look, we’ll bring some toys—”

Gaster hurriedly gathers up as many things as he can—snacks and drinks, Sans’ blocks and a few picture books, blankets and pillows. He ducks out of the house, and he can hear the neighbors shouting. Monsters flee frantically across the streets, clutching hats and scarves and sobbing children. He sees Fuku running towards her father’s bar, and he calls out to her.

“Fuku! Fuku, come here—into the basement, quickly. It’s safer there.”

_Dad!_ she signs frantically. _My dad!_

“I’ll go and fetch him, just get inside. Hurry!” He herds her into the basement and sets Sans down against the far wall. He’s broken into full-fledged sobbing now, fat white tears streaking his cheeks, and he reaches desperately for Gaster when he steps away. 

“Up,” he wails, his bones rattling in fear. “Da, up!”

Gaster turns and runs. He hears Sans screaming behind him until he slams the basement door shut. The streets have already emptied, and a deathly silence has fallen over the town, shattered only by the desperate wails of the sirens. He runs across town, his boots crunching noisily on the snow and his coattail flapping behind him. The windows at Grillby’s bar are, for once, dim and dark. He skids to a stop in front of the door, jiggling it frantically, but to no avail—the deadbolt has been locked. He can move it with his magic, but he has a feeling he’ll be scorched for his trouble, if he tries that.

“Grillby!” he shouts, moving over to bang a fist against the window, despite how futile the noise is. Stars, he hopes someone else is inside, because Grillby won’t be able to hear him. “Guys, it’s Dr. Gaster. Come with me—the basement is safer. Fuku’s there!”

The deadbolt unlocks a few seconds later, and Gaster is ruthlessly yanked into the bar. 

_Fuku? She’s safe?_ Grillby demands.

“Yes, in the basement of my house. Please, come with me. It’s safer there—the walls are all concrete, and the door is impossible to get through unless you have a key.”

Grillby glances back at his bar. Several frightened sets of eyes peer over the top of it.

“All of you,” Gaster says, stepping forward. “All of you, you must come with me. It isn’t safe enough here. The windows could be broken in, the walls could be burned down. The basement is our safest option.”

Slowly, the monsters cowering behind the bar rise. Gaster glances back at Grillby, who nods solemnly. 

“Good. We’ll move together. Stay close to me. Once everyone is in, we’ll lock and barricade the door. See if the human can get through _that.”_ He grits his teeth, turning back towards the bar’s door. “Ready?”

When he receives several murmured affirmations, he flings the door open and bolts. He hears the trample of feet behind him, and he yanks the basement door open as soon as they reach it, ushering people down the stairs. The room is small and cramped, but it’s safe. As soon as everyone is inside, Gaster hauls the door closed and locks it. 

“Pull those chairs up,” he orders, and several monsters scramble to obey. “We’ll wedge them under the doorknob. They’ll—”

_Gaster._ Grillby sets a hand on his shoulder, pulling him around so he’ll watch the elemental’s hands as he signs. _Sans is gone._

“What?!”

Fuku stands behind her father, trembling. _I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I couldn’t stop him, he used—he used blue magic, I couldn’t go after him, it was too heavy, I’m sorry—_

Gaster wrenches the door back open. Grillby snags the back of his jacket.

“Let _go!”_ Gaster snarls, shoving his hand off.

_I’m not trying to stop you. Let me go with you. I can—_

“No. Stay here. You have your own responsibilities.” He looks pointedly at Fuku. “Take care of the townspeople. I’ll be fine.”

_Gaster—_

“I’ll be back in a few moments.” He lurches up the stairs, slamming the door shut behind him. Shit. Shit shit _shit shit shit shit—_

The snow falls thickly around him, and he can barely make out the faint impressions of tiny pawprints around him. He follows them past Grillby’s (Sans must have run by while he was inside) and further towards the woods. He doesn’t dare shout, lest he attract the human’s attention. 

In the distance, he hears a dog scream.

Gaster breaks into a run, his breath clouding around his mouth in desperate gasps. Once he leaves the main road and bolts across the wooden bridge to enter the forest, the snow begins to drift around his legs. He plows forward, his bones shaking, scanning the area around him frantically. If Sans is still wearing his jacket, he should be easy to see—but if he’s shifted, then it’s all too likely that the ill-fitting clothes were left behind. Gaster wishes he had checked before he left the basement. 

He staggers up a hill, pausing at the top to pant and reorient himself. Everything looks the same here, between the snow and the skeletal trees. Then his eye catches on something—a splatter of pale magic against a tree, undoubtedly from a wound. He feels sick. He stumbles after the magictrail, wrapping his arms around himself. The trail ends in a lump of black and white fur, and a human stands in front of it, their eyes blazing. Between the two of them stands—stands—

Stands a small, trembling blaster. 

Terror surges through Gaster’s bones, followed closely by rage. How dare this human look at his son like that. _How fucking dare they._

Sans crouches, baring his teeth. A small, reedy growl comes from his throat, and the spines along his back bristle in a desperate attempt to make himself seem bigger. The human sneers. They don’t appear injured at all, although their soul glows blue—with Sans’ power? _No,_ Gaster decides, reaching out and tightening his own blue magic around the human’s soul, _with_ their _power._

The human staggers a step forward, their knees trembling under the weight of their soul. Sans digs his claws into the snow, holding himself low to the ground. A high, buzzing whine begins to tremble in the air. Gaster recognizes that sound—he is intimately attuned to it, from his own blasters. Sparks of white magic flicker in Sans’ ribcage, swirling around his soul, solidifying into a hot mass of energy. 

“What?” the human sneers. “The other one couldn’t hurt me and you think _you’re_ going to do anything?”

Well. If that’s the way Sans wants to win this fight.

Gaster summons his reserves of magic, and he feels his blaster form behind him. A single blaster, so he can feed it as much energy as possible, make it bigger—bigger than, by all rights, it should be. Let its shoulders tower above the trees. Let its chest become a cannon. Let its fangs become swords. He can feel his eyes glowing, wisps of purple magic flickering around his sockets, and around the blaster’s. The human’s eyes grow wide as they notice him—or, more precisely, as they notice the enormous beast looming behind him. 

_“Get the fuck away,”_ Gaster hisses, and his voice reverbarates and booms from the blaster’s chest, _“from my son.”_

The human stumbles a step back, and Sans’ bifurcated lower jaw snaps wide to release the blast of magic concentrated in his chest. It sears forward in a blaze of crackling white light, and the human howls as it strikes their shoulder and knocks them backwards in the snow. Sans whirls around, his eyes wide and glowing fierce yellow. His tail begins to wag when he sees Gaster and the blaster, but he doesn’t run towards him. Instead, he steps protectively over the lump of black and white fur on the ground.

_“Down, Sans,”_ Gaster commands, and Sans obediently drops his body, pressing the underside of his spine to the bundle of fur he guards. Gaster guides the blaster behind him to dig its claws into the snow, bracing itself. Its back arches, and magic begins to hum and whine in its chest. _“Let Dad show you how it’s done.”_

The adult blaster’s lower jaw swings open, and a blaze of white magic erupts from its maw. The blast surges forward, scalding the air around it, heading straight for the human even as they’re trying to scramble back to their feet. They deserve to die—of that, Gaster is convinced. Humans aren’t like monsters. Most of them don’t have souls worth saving, especially not the ones who are willing to fight a _baby._ Still, Gaster himself has never—he’s never—

Well, he’s never killed anyone. (He’s far too much of a coward for that.)

So if by chance the blast happens to swerve to the side at the last moment—well, Gaster decides to blame it on the wind. Even so, the blast knocks the human back again, and Gaster hears an awful _crack_ as they strike a tree. They slump at the base of the trunk, limp and unmoving. 

“Stay, Sans,” Gaster says, stalking past Sans with his blaster at his heels. Each step the beast takes rattles the ground. Sans stays put, panting with anxiety. Gaster kneels beside the human, reaching out to feel for a pulse. One still beats strongly in their neck, as he figured it would. Humans are notoriously difficult to kill. He removes his scarf, quickly disarming and binding the human’s hands.

“Doggo?” someone shouts, staggering into the clearing—Lesser Dog, her eyes wide and her fur slicked with white magic. “Dog—Gaster? Sans?”

“It’s alright,” Gaster says, straightening up. “The human is contained, but it needs to be taken to King Asgore as soon as possible. I don’t know when it will awaken.” 

“What about Doggo?” Lesser Dog demands, racing for the bundle of fur on the ground. Sans growls a warning, but she snaps her teeth at him and he relents, shifting away from Doggo’s body. She sniffs along Doggo’s ribs and belly, then breathes a shuddering sigh of relief. “Oh, thank the stars. He’s alive. What _happened?”_

“I don’t know,” Gaster says, crossing the clearing and scooping Sans into his arms. His son immediately burrows into his jacket, whining, and he hushes him softly. “Sans escaped the basement when the human came. He went looking for me, and he must have heard Doggo’s fight and come here to help him. When I got here, Doggo was already unconscious.”

“And the human?”

Gaster sets his jaw. “I dealt with them.”

“You did _that?_ All by yourself?” The look of distrust in her eyes is enough to confirm Gaster’s answer. He doesn’t want that look aimed at Sans, not ever. _He’s_ the one they should be scared of. Sans is just a—just a baby. (A baby with distinctive predatory qualities.)

“I did.”

“Remind me to never get on your bad side.”

“If you insist.”

Greater Dog bursts into the clearing, followed closely by the Dogi. They skid to a stop next to Lesser Dog, and the four of them talk quickly and quietly amongst themselves. Greater Dog lifts Doggo’s body with reverent care, holding him close to his chest. The Dogi head for the human, their lips pulled back from their teeth and their hackles up.

“I’ll escort you back to town, Dr. Gaster,” Lesser Dog says, bounding to his side on all fours—it’s far easier for her to move through the snow that way. “Follow me.”

Gaster follows her. Back at the basement, she assures everyone that the situation is in hand. “The king will deal with the human swiftly and efficiently,” she says, standing silhouetted in the light from the basement doorway. “You have nothing to fear. You may return to your homes, but keep an ear out for the rest of the day. If the alarms should sound again, return here or to the nearest available shelter at once. A clear alert will sound once the human soul has been successfully contained.”

As soon as Lesser Dog retreats, the townspeople flood out of the basement. Gaster follows them more slowly, exhausted and sick with fear. Sans trembles in his arms. 

_Dr. Gaster?_ Fuku stops in front of him, shifting her weight nervously. _Is he...okay?_

“He is,” Gaster murmurs. “There’s nothing to worry about. This wasn’t your fault, you understand?”

_But I should have been watching him! I’m so much bigger, and strong, I—I should have been able to—_

“Enough.” He crouches, resting a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t blame you. Sans is...wily, when he needs to be, and it appears he has powerful magic already. This wasn’t your fault. What matters is that the both of you are safe. Don’t feel bad, okay?” He reaches up, ruffling the green flames along the top of her head.

_Okay. Sans?_ She reaches up to pet his head, and he leans against her. _I’m glad you’re alright._

Over her head, Grillby lifts his own hands to sign. _Thank you, Gaster._

He inclines his head, and he watches as the two of them leave his basement and drifts back towards the bar—two gleaming spots of warmth in a bitterly cold world. He trudges up the stairs after them, his joints stiff and achy. Not even his heavy winter clothes were made for such extended times in the cold. He may be a skeleton, but he’s not completely immune to the temperature, and neither is his son. Once he’s back inside, he runs Sans a warm bath, carefully scrubbing him off and examining him for injuries. He finds none, thank the stars. 

“What were you thinking?” he asks—he means it to come out as a scold, but his voice is weak and weary. “Running out into the woods like that? You know you’re never supposed to go there, not without an adult. You could have been hurt, or—or—”

He swallows.

“No,” Sans mumbles. His head hangs low, his tail down. 

“What would I do if something happened to you, Sans?” he demands, hooking a hand underneath his son’s chin and urging it up so he can meet his eyes. Sans’ eyelights skitter desperately away from him. “You’re smarter than that. What you did for Doggo was noble, but _stupid._ There’s no way you can defeat a human on your own. You should have called for help right away.”

Sans’ shoulders hunch. 

Gaster sits back on his heels, scrubbing his face and reaching for a towel. “I don’t suppose it matters. You’re too little to understand, aren’t you?” But—but even if he _is_ little, there are a few things that must _absolutely_ not go unchecked. He reaches out and dries Sans off, then sets him down on the rug. “Attention, Sans.”

Sans’ eyes drift reluctantly to him.

“You discovered magic.” Gaster holds a hand out, summons a small blue bone. _Magic,_ he signs. _This is magic._

“Gic,” Sans repeats softly. “Magic.”

“Yes. Magic. And you are _not allowed_ to use it, do you understand?” Gaster crushes the blue bone between his fingers. “Using it is _bad._ You are little, but you are already very powerful. Powerful magic hurts people, if you don’t know how to control it. It hurts them very badly. Do you understand?”

Sans shuffles his paws.

“Sans. Answer me. Do you understand that magic is bad?”

“Magic,” he mumbles. “No.”

“Precisely. No magic. Not until you’re older and I can teach you how to control it. If I find out that you’ve been using it, I will be very upset. I will have to—I will have to punish you. Neither one of us will like that.” Gaster _especially_ will not like that. Also he, um. He has no idea how to. He’s never had to before. “So please, just—don’t use magic until you’re older. I don’t want you to hurt yourself or someone else accidentally. Especially when you’re in this form, because the magic that comes from here—” He taps his sternum, signs _blast._ “—is very, very dangerous. Okay?”

“‘kay,” Sans says softly.

“Good.” Gaster reaches out, scooping Sans into his arms and standing. “And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have left you in the basement like that. I knew you were scared, but I had to—I had to save my friends, you understand? Dad can’t always be there. You have to get used to being left on your own.” He hugs Sans close to him, leans their heads together and sways on his feet. Sans lets out a shuddery breath. 

A few minutes later, the all clear sounds.

An hour after that, while Gaster is preparing dinner, there’s a knock at the door. He already knows who it is.

“Asgore,” he says, opening the door. “I’m so sorry.”

The king stands in front him, great head bowed and shoulders slumped. He does not speak.

“Come inside, please.” Gaster guides him into the bathroom. He fills the sink with warm water and washes gaudy red blood from the white fur of his king’s hands. A splash of hydrogen peroxide removes the faint stains that remain. He helps the king out of his battle armor and replaces it with a pair of sweatpants—far too big for Gaster himself, but kept in one of the dressers for just this purpose. Once that’s finished, he scans Asgore’s soul. His HP is low, but not dangerously so.

“Dinner is almost ready,” he says, shepherding Asgore into the living room. “You should eat.”

“As?” Sans asks, peering up at the king, his tail beginning to wag. “Asgore? Hi?”

Asgore slumps into the couch, silent and numb. 

“Sans,” Gaster says quietly, crouching and touching the child on the head. “Be easy with him. He doesn’t feel very well.”

“Oh.” Sans’ tail-wagging slows slightly. 

Gaster goes to finish dinner—macaroni and cheese, pork chops, and stewed vegetables. He prepares a bowl of the vegetables for Sans _first,_ since if he offers them along with the other two options, Sans will fill himself up with everything else before he even sniffs the vegetables. He sets the table, then returns to the living room.

“Ah,” he murmurs, his own shoulders slumping with sorrow.

Sans has shifted into his smaller form, and he’s clutched tightly in Asgore’s arms. He has one tiny fist balled in the fur of Asgore’s chest, his head resting against the king’s massive shoulder. Asgore’s head is bowed low, his muzzle touching Sans’ skull. Glowing white tears streak through the fur of his cheeks. His eyes are squeezed shut. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, over and over again. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, little one, so very sorry—”

Gaster takes a seat next to them, tentatively setting a hand on Asgore’s shoulder. Asgore reaches out and draws Gaster to his chest, too, squeezing tightly. “It’s alright,” Gaster murmurs, signing steadily. “Asgore, it’s alright. You were only doing what you had to. You saved us.”

“They were so little—so little,” Asgore says, wretched. “And so tired, at the end, but they just—just kept fighting, even when they were scared, and they knew it was hopeless. Why? Why do they have to come here and hurt us? Haven’t humans done enough already? Can’t they just leave us _alone?”_

Gaster pets the king’s head gently. The fur is damp under his palm, matted with sweat. “I know,” he murmurs. “I know. They’re exceedingly cruel.”

“You really did a number on the child, though,” Asgore says, his voice bitter. Gaster tries not to take it personally. “They were only half-alive, when they got to me. It certainly made my job easier.”

Gaster remains silent. His soul feels cold.

When Asgore speaks again, the bitterness in his voice is replaced, once again, by heartache. “They were just a baby,” he whispers, resting a paw over Sans’ skull. “Just a baby, Gaster, and I slaughtered them.”

“You saved us,” Gaster repeats firmly. “It had to be done.”

“...did it?”

Gaster…wonders, but he refuses to admit that to his king. It would do nothing to assuage his guilt. “Yes. They were dangerous. They were killing people. What was their LV?”

“Only three.”

“And I’m sure it would have been much higher, by the time they had reached the capital. You did us all a favor. You defeated a murderer. Now, come on. Get up.” He squirms out of Asgore’s hold, tugging the king to his feet. “You need to eat something. You’ll feel better once you do.”

“I feel sick.”

“At least try to drink some tea, alright? Look, I have golden flower steeping right now—”

Gaster harangues Asgore into eating, relieved when his HP recovers. And if Asgore spends most of the night holding Sans, after that? Well, Gaster can’t begrudge him. A little bit of Sans-snuggling is good for the soul. He can’t help but look at Sans, though, and remember—

That was what Sans was made to do. Slaughtering humans was to be his job. He can’t fathom it now. Sans? Killing a human? 

Impossible.

* * *

That night, when Sans wakes up in his crib and begins to howl for his father, Gaster rolls over and clamps a pillow over his head to muffle the noise. It’s a needy cry, at first, as it always is—but the longer Gaster waits to go and get him, the more frantic it becomes. It sounds like heartbreak. But he has to learn, doesn’t he? Because one day, Gaster is going to die, and Sans—

Sans is going to be left alone.

An hour later, Sans falls silent. When Gaster goes to wake him the next morning, there are tear tracks dried on his cheeks, and Gaster feels like the biggest piece of shit in the world.

* * *

“Asgore?”

“Hm? You’re calling early, Wingdings. Is something the matter?”

“Er—in a way. I was just looking for some advice, actually. I mean, I’ve read the books, but I wanted some input from an actual parent.”

“Oh? What about?”

“About—disciplining kids. How do you—?”

“Ah. Tricky, that. Is Sans getting into trouble?”

“No. Well, not yet, but he _is_ well into the terrible twos now. I expect I’ll need to begin disciplining him sooner rather than later. But I don’t want to...fuck him up. You know? And I feel guilty even _thinking_ about punishing him. I wish he was older. Then we could just talk things out, rationally.”

“I’m afraid toddlers aren’t much for rational conversations, heh. Especially not when they’re having tantrums. How were you thinking about disciplining him?”

“Well, the books recommended time-outs. They seemed firmly against corporal punishment, which I tend to agree with. I mean, doesn’t hitting a child just—reinforce the fact that hitting is okay, if you’re bigger and it gets you what you want? It seems foolish.”

“That it does. How did your mother punish you?”

“...”

“Wingdings?”

“Corporeal punishment. I suppose it was effective. I mean, it wasn’t as though she was beating me. My mother was really a very kind woman, and I respect her to this day. I was just a bit of an, er—curious and rambunctious child.”

“Really? You, rambunctious?”

“Belive it or not. I was terrible. Always getting into things, running circles around my poor mother—she had enough to deal with, raising nine children. I can’t blame her for getting impatient.”

“Nine, oof.”

“Yes, it was excessive. Two is excessive. One is almost too many. I can’t imagine being a rabbit…”

“How many does Erika have now?”

“Egh. Twelve.”

“Lord.”

“It’s no wonder they have such short lifespans. They’re good parents, though, for what it’s worth. Erika is a very admirable mother. But that’s off-topic—I’d prefer to avoid corporeal punishment with Sans. It doesn’t sit right with me.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Well—hm. Disciplining toddlers is a lot more than simply punishing them. You have to set them up for success, first and foremost. Transitions are _terrible._ Always give them warnings because you move from one activity to another. Asriel _hated_ going from playtime to dinner, so Toriel and I would give him little count-downs. ‘Twenty minutes until dinner, now ten, now five…’ Like that. It really helped.”

“Alright, I’ll try that. Although Sans is usually pretty good about doing from playtime to dinner. He likes his food.”

“Good! He needs a healthy appetite. He’s a growing boy. Erm, what else—well, you have to have rules in place before you can discipline for them. Try to make them clear and simple, and maybe hang them up somewhere, so he can always seem them and know they’re there, even if he can’t read yet.”

“He’s starting to read.”

“Is he really?”

“Mm-hm. Only little words. ‘A’ and ‘the’ and ‘me.’ He seems to enjoy it.”

“Clever scamp, that one. Oh, and if you think he might be about to get into trouble, distract and redirect. A lot of discipline is just keeping them _out_ of trouble, so you don’t have to punish them. He’s old enough now that you may want to start giving him little choices, so he can have some independence. Let him choose what cup he wants, or what clothes he wants to wear.”

“Alright. I think he can manage that.”

“Do you think _you_ can? You’re a bit of, er—well, a bit of a control freak.”

“Oh, trust me, I know. I think I can manage it. Hopefully. What about tantrums?”

“Goodness, tantrums. There are lot of different opinions about those. I can’t tell you exactly what will be best for Sans.”

“What did you and Toriel do for Asriel?”

“Asriel rarely had tantrums. When he did, it was usually because he was overstimulated. Toddlers are little monsters with big emotions, and they don’t always know how to manage them. So we’d take Asriel aside, someplace calm and quiet, and just hold him until he calmed down. When he was a little bit older, we’d try to talk about why he was upset, and we’d offer him some self-soothing techniques or different ways to express his emotions.”

“Right. Well, I’m hoping Sans won’t have any tantrums—he’s a very laid-back child—but I’ll keep that in mind just in case.”

“Yes. He is very laid-back, isn’t he…?”

* * *

“No no no no no _no no no no—”_ Sans shouts, throwing himself rather dramatically onto the couch. “No!”

Gaster takes a deep, slow breath. “Sans, I told you we were going to get ready to leave in five minutes. It has been five minutes. We are leaving now.”

“Nuh-uh!”

“Yes, we are. Now, I need you to come with me so we can get dressed—”

_“No no no no—”_

“ —and get to Grillby’s. Come, now, do you really want to miss Fuku’s party?”

Sans screams at the top of his lungs.

“Oh my god.” Gaster buries his face in his hands. Having children is awful. Why the fuck did he create a child. Why the _fuck._ He is the least-qualified person—“That’s enough, Sans. What advantage is this gaining you? It’s certainly not doing anything to convince me.”

Gaster takes a step forward, and Sans’ scream cuts off sharply. Somehow, that’s even worse. He opens one eyesocket, watching Gaster furiously. A yellow glow-iris snaps to life around his eyelight, which darkens in response. Why the _hell_ is a toddler capable of looking so threatening? Ridiculous. Simply ridiculous.

“Sans,” Gaster says, trying to keep his voice calm but firm. “No. You do not use magi—”

Gaster’s soul pings blue. His knees buckle under the sudden weight, and he stumbles a step forward to catch himself. This little _heathen—_

“Sans, that is _enough._ Release me at once.”

“No!” Sans squeezes a chubby fist. It doesn’t do much, but Gaster feels the pressure around his soul tighten minisculely. When Sans thrusts that hand away from himself, Gaster stumbles backwards a step. “Bad!”

“I’m going to count to three,” Gaster says, gritting his teeth, although he’s—not quite sure what’s going to happen once he gets to three. “One, two—”

Sans jerks his hand down, and Gaster’s legs struggle to keep him upright.

“Three.”

Sans shrieks, kicking his feet. Gaster surges forward, wrapping his son in his arms. He takes a seat on the couch (because his legs aren’t going to keep _both_ of them upright, not with that blue magic) and holds Sans close to his chest, pinning his arms between them. Sans howls in unabashed fury, and Gaster feels magic crackle down his bones as he begins to change. He twists and shifts in Gaster’s arms, and Gaster calmly readjusts his grip to maintain his hold on the blaster pup now in his grip. 

“Leggo,” Sans snarls, snapping his teeth together. His lower jaw opens and shuts again, rapid little warning clicks, and his claws tear rends through Gaster’s sweater.

“Nope,” Gaster says. “Not until you’ve settled down.”

Sans’ teeth brush across his arm, clicking noisily over the bone, but they never bite down—not as hard as they’re capable of. Gaster is fully aware that a true bite from those jaws can crush bone, even at this age, and Sans is applying only a minimal amount of pressure. He has no intent to hurt. This is a threat display only, a bluff, and one that Gaster is more than alright with calling. 

Sans does not take well to this reaction—or lack thereof. Frustrated tears pool in his eyes, and he shakes his head. His breath comes shorter and faster. Gaster isn’t surprised when he begins to sob, prickling his claws against Gaster’s chest. “Da,” he wails. “Da, no no no no.”

“Shhh.” Gaster runs a hand from the crest of Sans’ head down his spine. “Shh, shh, little one, it’s alright. You’re alright. I know you’re upset, and that’s—okay, but this isn’t how we deal with it. You know that.”

Sans whines in misery.

“I’m not mad,” Gaster says, and to his surprise, he finds that it’s true—Sans doesn’t know any better. He’s little and overwhelmed and lashing out the only way he knows how. “It’s okay if you don’t want to do something, and it’s okay to tell me that, but I don’t like it when you shout and fight. I especially don’t like it when you use magic on me. I told you not to do that, remember?”

Sans buries his face against Gaster’s neck, and Gaster can feel the heat of his tears as they trail down his muzzle. He rocks Sans gently, leaning down to click his teeth across the slope of his skull. Slowly, Sans begins to settle, drawing deeper breaths and slumping against Gaster. After several minutes, he begins to shift forms again. When he’s finished, he curls his hand and circles it over his sternum. 

_Sorry._

_It’s okay,_ Gaster signs back. _Still angry?_

_No._

_Still sad?_

Sans hesitates. _Yes._

_That’s alright. You can be sad. Being sad is okay. People have...big emotions, sometimes. They can be scary. Are you scared?_

_...yes._

_You don’t have to be. I’m here, and I’ll help you. But first—_ He motions towards his soul. _Let go, please._

_Sorry._ The blue magic whisks away from his soul. _Bad magic._

_Yes, it was. Please try not to do that again._

_Bad._ Sans frowns, his hands fumbling in front of him. _Bad S-M._

_S-M?_

Sans nods.

_What do you mean?_

_S-M._ He hooks a finger towards himself. _Me._

_You mean S-N. S-A-N-S. And no—you’re not bad, Sans._

Sans glances away. _Yes._

_No. You made a mistake. That doesn’t make you bad. It’s okay to make mistakes. I’m here to help you learn from them, okay? Why were you angry?_

Sans shrugs, chewing the tip of his thumb.

_You don’t know why you were angry?_

_No, don’t know word._

_You don’t know how to tell me why you were angry? You don’t know the words?_

_Yes._

_That’s alright. Learning language is frustrating, since you don’t know how to communicate all your needs and wants. Were you upset because you don’t want to see Fuku?_

_No._

_Because you didn’t want to stop playing here?_

_No._

_Because you don’t want to go to the party? Too many people, too much noise?_

Sans nods. 

_Thank you for telling me. I thought you liked Grillby’s, though._

_Yes._

_Are you just tired today?_

_Yes._ Sans pauses, then tries the sign himself. _Tired. Sad._

_Because you’re hungry? Thirsty? Want to eat or drink?_

_No._

_Nap?_

_Yes._

_Kind of what I thought. How about you lay down here and I’ll turn on some cartoons? I’ll call Grillby and talk to him, and maybe this evening we can go see Fuku and give her your gift. Would you like that?_

_Yes._

Gaster gently sets Sans back down on the couch, flicking the TV on. He snags a fleece blanket from upstairs, sprawling it out over his son, who snuggles gratefully into the warmth. He kneels next to the couch, reaching out and resting a hand on Sans’ skull. “Go to sleep, little one. I love you.”

A flicker of a smile crosses Sans’ face, and he holds up his own hand—the sign for _I love you._

God, he’s got a great fucking kid.

* * *

_Sans, did your dad ever tell you about dragons?_

_No,_ Sans signs, then repeats the sign for _dragon_ —a waggle of fingers in front of his mouth, to mime their flames. _What? Dragon—what?_

_Don’t go filling his head with fairytales, now, Grillby,_ Gaster says, chomping on a fry. 

_Fairy tales._ Grillby scoffs. _This is my culture._

Gaster holds his hands up in surrender. He decidedly does not mention how much of culture comes from folklore.

_Dragons were great scholars,_ Grillby continues, offering Sans a pickle slice. Sans munches readily on it, watching Grillby’s hands as he signs. Grillby snaps his fingers, and a tiny flame dragon flares to life on the bar. It spreads little, translucent wings, and Sans’ eyes go round as saucers. _Many people will tell you they were warriors, but that’s only what they were forced to become. Like most monsters, they had no desire to fight. They were one of the oldest known species of monster—almost as old as we elementals. They were enormous, and they had great big wings—that’s how you could tell them apart from their smaller cousins, the drakes._

Sans grabs at the tiny flame dragon, but his fingers phase straight through it. It prowls up his arm, snaking itself around his shoulders and crackling merrily. _They came in all sorts of beautiful colors,_ Grillby continues, and the flames that make up the dragon’s body shift between hues—red and blues, yellows and greens, white and blacks. It stops on a gleaming purple. _Some said their scales were made of precious jewels, although I believe that’s a bit of an exaggeration._

_Dragon,_ Sans repeats, ecstatic. He pats the flames that lap at his vertebrae and the collar of his jacket, giggling. _Color._

“And what color is that, Sans?” Gaster asks, watching his son fondly. 

_Purple!_

“Very good.”

_Yes, well done, scamp. That’s purple. Now, a long, long time ago—before even humans were around—the dragons made a pact with fire elementals. We gave them the power of fire, and they gave us protection. Each dragon, after it was old enough to grow its wings, chose a willing elemental to become its partner. The two of them intertwined their magic, and were thus linked for the rest of their lives._

_Magic._ Sans narrows his eyes. _Magic bad._

_Only when it’s misused,_ Grillby corrects. _The dragons and elementals used their magic to protect their families and flocks. The dragons also began reaching out to other elementals—there were ice-breathing dragons, dragons who could summon great storms and roar loudly enough to shatter rock, dragons who could shift the earth with their minds. They were incredible—and that, ultimately, was their downfall._

_Sugarcoat,_ Gaster signs desperately. _Sugarcoat._

_Ah—and so, er, the humans became very scared of the dragons, even though dragons—like all monsters—are made of love and compassion. The humans wanted to make the dragons their...pets, kind of. That’s what humans do, you see. When they fear something, they try to control it. For a time, that worked. The dragons were unwilling to wage war, and so they consented to the humans’ wishes. But after that, too, proved to be a—a bad decision, a few of the dragons tried to escape. And—well, they all disappeared._

Sans’ lower job wobbles. _All gone?_

_Well, that’s what most people believe,_ Grillby admits. The tiny flame dragon nuzzles Sans’ jaw comfortingly. _But their dus—er, evidence of them...being gone forever, it hasn’t been found. Some monsters believe they’re still around—on the surface, even, waiting for us all to return and join them._

_Surface!_

_Yes, that’s right. The surface._ He pushes Sans a sippy cup of chocolate milk. _Some day, kiddo._

_What really happened?_ Gaster asks Grillby, when Sans has turned his full attention to his milk. _To the dragons?_

_Oh, come now, as though you’re interested in fairytales._

_No, you’re right. It’s part of your culture, and I shouldn’t patronize it._ He props his face in his hands. _So? What happened?_

Grillby glances over to make sure Sans isn’t watching, then signs, _The humans enslaved them. It was painfully easy to do. If you had a dragon, you could control its elemental. If you had an elemental, you could control its dragon._

_And all dragons had elementals?_

_Well, not all, but most. Certainly, the strongest ones did. According to one of my old friends, his great-great-great grandmothers were actually partners with two of the dragons who rebelled against the humans. Oh, what were their names? Tsk._ Grillby drums his fingers on the bar. _Ah! Iskierka and Arkady._

_...Arkady, huh?_ Something about that name itches at the back of Gaster’s mind.

_Indeed. His name meant ‘the spirit of carrying on’ in the dragons’ language. Today, I suppose ‘perseverance’ would be a closer translation. He was Iskierka’s younger brother—she was one of the rebellion’s primary leaders, and he was her wingman._ The purple dragon leaps off of Sans’ shoulders, twirling through the air. Heavy armor, made of gray smoke, springs to life along its lithe body. _Of course, by the time the rebellion reared its head, the dragons’ race had already been more or less destroyed. The humans tried any way they could to weaponize the dragons; most of it involved cruel medieval experiments._

Guilt flashes through Gaster’s bones. That’s...what he had tried to do with Sans, wasn’t it? Perhaps with no purposeful cruelty, but then—cruelty is rarely purposeful. Even the worst people can rationalize their actions. 

_Some of those experiments were successful. Most were not. The dragons were killed off quickly. By the time their rebellion started, they were weak—and even the strongest monster is hard-pressed to stand against a human military. They all fell down. The funny thing is, though, the ones who had undergone human experimentation didn’t turn to dust. Many theorize it was because of how the human’s magic had polluted their own. If they could reach the bodies, the elementals buried the dragons in their homeland. At least, that’s how the story goes—before we were forced Underground, there was never any evidence of those dragons found. No dust, no bone, no talons or teeth or scales._ Grillby shrugs. The flame dragon poofs out of existence. _So you’re probably right. It’s just a folktale—but it’s a pretty good one, eh?_

_What if they got up and left?_ Gaster suggests—a fanatical theory, but one his mind latches onto anyhow. _The skeletons of the dragons who didn’t dust, I mean. What if they weren’t_ really _dead? They just lost so much magic that most of their form rotted._

Grillby arches an eyebrow at him. _Oh? And where did these skeleton dragons go?_

Gaster beams and summons a blaster head. Sans coos a greeting at it.

_Those are drakes, silly._ Grillby taps him in the forehead. _Even_ I _know that. Wingless shorties._

_Well, they’re taller than_ you, Gaster huffs. He pats his blaster’s jaw. _Don’t listen to him, bud. He’s just jealous. Anyway, what’s the big deal? Drake, dragon—one can fly, the other can’t. There’s not much of a difference._

_Um, hello, yes there is,_ Grillby says. Gaster flicks a hand and his blaster dissolves. _Drakes never had a pact with elementals. They were just—big lizard-dogs._

_Hey, that’s my kid you’re talking about._

_And a cute lizard-dog he is,_ Grillby agrees, turning and ruffling a hand over Sans’ skull to get his attention. _Isn’t that right, Sans? Aren’t you a cute lizard-dog?_

Sans nods earnestly. 

_Drake,_ Gaster corrects him. _Blasters are drakes, Sans. Or, er—a specialized subspecies thereof._

He’s not actually quite sure how blasters came into existence, or why their DNA is so closely bonded to hominid skeletons’. It’s a facet of skeleton history he hasn’t been able to find many books on; of course, there are lots of facets of skeleton history he hasn’t been able to find books on. Having your sole source of literary information be a waterfall in a dump has its downsides, and there were very few skeletons left to bring history books with them on the journey to the Underground.

(In fact, there was only one, and he was four. The only things he brought with him were a pair of ratty pajamas, a half-burned picture book, and a gift from a long-absent father—a stuffed purple dragon with tears through its seams. He had been carried into the Underground by a young elemental soldier, whom he had forgotten shortly after in all of the grief and chaos that surrounded him. He would meet this same elemental many years later, at a bar settled in the chilly little town of Snowdin—but that’s a story for another Time.)

* * *

“Heya, Dr. Gaster?” a royal guard sticks their head into the lab, waving cheerfully. “I’ve got a quick request for you, from the Canine Unit.”

“Yes?” Gaster asks, sliding a petri dish into the incubator before peeling off his gloves and turning to face them. “Jackson, would you mind—the _E. coli—”_

“On it,” Jackson says, already moving towards the hot water bath where their frozen _E. coli_ have been thawing. 

“Here.” The guard hands Gaster a thin folder. “Just a quick little thing. The unit found copious amounts of dust in the forest. No one has been reported dead or missing, so they’re wondering where the dust came from. They’d like you to collect a sample and let them know who—or what—it came from.”

“Oh, wait, can I go?” Jackson asks, his feathers ruffling with excitement. “I’ve been meaning to pop down to Snowdin. My sister lives there.”

“Well, I don’t see why not,” Gaster says, already eagerly reaching for another pair of gloves. His germ colonies are waiting. (Chemoautotrophs, modified to produce excess energy from the oxidation of iron. Hopefully, in time, they’ll be able to improve the Core’s energy output. It’s an exciting process.) “Just report your findings to me, please.”

“Will do. Thanks, Dr. Gaster. I’ll be back in just a couple of hours.”

“Take your time. I’m sure it won’t be that exciting. Probably just a big animal or something...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> can you tell i,,,love dragons,,,
> 
> also! the two dragon names in this chap (iskierka and arkady) come from the incredible series _temeraire_ by naomi novik. if you like dragons, you should absolutely 100% read those books. i cannot recommend them highly enough. they are so damn g o o d. i just had to pay tribute to em with a little bit of dragon lore in this fic, ha ha.
> 
> less-than-fun fact: dragons' scales were not actually made of jewels, but they were still colorful and extremely strong, and valued as both decoration and armor. however, they couldnt be harvested after death bc the dragons would dust; that was one of the reasons why humans strove to keep dragons from dusting. (also bc they wanted to harvest fangs, talons, hides, etc.) in the event that they couldn't do that, however, they would simply yank sections of the dragons' scales out and then wait for them to regrow, which usually took a few years. it was a pretty horrific time for everybody involved.


	9. free-range fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: none! enjoy ur last fluffy chapter for a while, folks
> 
> "I never stopped wanting to be ...the smart boy...so that she would love me." — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

Sans survives his terrible two and threes. (So does Gaster, though it was a struggle at times.) His vocabulary develops in leaps and bounds. He speaks fluent Hands and Wingdings, and Gaster had hired a tutor to help him learn Common, after he’d turned three, but it was more or less unnecessary. He’s learned most of the Common language by spending so much time with Alphys, Asgore, and the dogs. His physical development is slower, though not alarmingly so. He’s a chunky little guy, made of thick, sturdy bone and dense magic. His HP cap soars—he reaches 50 by the time he’s four. Gaster’s own HP cap remains steady; Sans sucks magic primarily from his AT and DF, right now. HP will be the last thing to go. 

(Gaster tries not to think about that part too much.)

As Sans grows, his personality also flourishes. He adores reading and learning about anything and everything, although many of his interests align with Gaster’s—physics, engineering, and (as of recently) biology. By the time he’s four, he’s also developed a passion for astronomy. (This may have something to do with the fact that Gaster bought him a telescope for his third birthday.) His magic, kept carefully under control, grows stronger each day, and each day he begs Gaster to teach him how to use it. Gaster supposes he’ll have to buckle, sometime soon.

In the meantime, Sans is beyond excited to start school, and he adores hanging out with their friends. He’s a charmer, and a tiny comedian, to boot. Gaster has no idea where his love for puns came from, and he tries to appreciate it, he _does,_ but sometimes puns just—don’t make sense to him. Wordplay rarely does, and he thought he was alright with that, but he does hate to disappoint his son. Sans cherishes making people laugh—he’ll simply light up if he can get a smile to cross someone’s face. So, even if Gaster doesn’t understand a joke, he’ll try his best to laugh and grin anyway. It makes Sans happy. That’s what matters. 

His blaster form has grown, too, and much faster than his skeleton form. He now stands three feet at the shoulder when in that form, roughly even with Gaster’s hip when they’re both standing, and the rest of his body has grown proportionally. His tail knocks over literally _everything._ Gaster now has a ‘no blasters in the kitchen’ rule to spare the lives of his plates and glasses. As he burns off some of his puppy energy, though, he _is_ tending towards laziness. He naps more often than not, and he isn’t playing with his toys quite as roughly anymore. 

Gaster himself is—content. Yes. He’s content. Far, far more content than he ever thought he could be. His lab projects are flourishing, his friends are kind and loyal and always there to offer a helping hand, and his son is the light of his life. He couldn’t ask for anything more. 

He’s working on aforementioned lab projects, one day, when Sans runs into his room and stumbles to a stop next to his chair. “Dad.”

“Hello, Sans. How are you?”

“Good. I gotta question.”

“Oh?” He sits back in his chair, folding his hands over his ribs. “Wonderful. Do ask.”

“Can I have a little brother?”

Gaster chokes.

“Or a little sister, that’s fine too, I just—” He rocks back and forth on his heels. “I was talking to Ipera ‘cause she was going to the shop and I saw her when she walked outside, and she said that her and Mello are gonna have another baby, so Manta can be a big brother. They said they wanted to wait ‘till Manta was older, so he wouldn’t need so much attention once they had the baby, and I think I’m old enough now that you could maybe have another baby too.”

Gaster rubs his temples. “Oh, Sans.”

“What’s the matter? Don’t you want one?”

“I—no, not particularly.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a—long story. Having a baby is a very important decision, and you can’t just make it lightly. It has to be planned for, and—and—certain sacrifices have to be made. Attention will be one of those sacrifices, certainly.”

“Well, that’s okay, right? I don’t need as much anymore. And we can plan for it. You could maybe have one next month even? So you have time to think, and buy another crib, and stuff.”

“No.”

Sans frowns but, to his credit, doesn't whine. “How come?”

“Sit down. If you’d like for me to, I’ll explain some very important things.”

Sans sits down.

“Do you know how babies are made?”

“Two people take their souls and squish them together to make another littler one,” Sans says. “And then one of the people grows the body inside them, or inside, an, uh—what’re they called? Artificial womb?”

“Yes, very good. That’s how most souls and bodies are made. But you, Sans—you’re special. I didn’t have anyone else to combine my soul with, so I did something a little different. I took a bit of my DNA, and I combined it with some of my magic, and I made your body on my own—but you still needed a soul. So I took a piece of my soul and I gave it to you, like all parents do. Since I’m the only person you share your soul with, though, that means I have to give you twice as much of everything. Does that make sense?”

Sans nods slowly, his bonebrow creased in thought. “So—it’s kind of like you already have two kids?”

“Kind of, soulwise.”

“How come you didn’t find another person to help you?”

“That’s—erm.” Gaster rubs the back of his neck. “That’s an even longer story. I’ll tell you when you’re older, okay? But if I created another child, I would need to use up a lot more of my soul. It wouldn’t be healthy for me. Besides, I like it, just the two of us. Don’t you?”

“Well—yeah, I guess.”

“Then what do you want a little sibling for?”

“They just seem kinda cool. I read about ‘em in books and stuff, and they’re always around to play with or talk to, and I just—” He shrugs. “I dunno.”

“Are you lonely?”

“Not really. I mean, Fuku doesn’t really wanna—hang out with me anymore, and the dogs are busy a lot, so. Maybe just a little. Could you adopt another baby? One that was already made?”

“I—could, yes, but that would also require time and attention that I don’t have, right now. I’m proud of how I’ve raised you, but I don’t know if I could manage it all over again. Being a dad is—it’s scary. There are so many things you can do wrong.”

“But you’re really good at it.”

A smile flickers across his face. “You think so?”

“Uh-huh.” Sans beams. “You’re the best dad in the world.”

“Thank you, Sans. I’m glad you think so.”

“So I think you would be a great dad for somebody else, too.”

“Perhaps, but I’ve—I’ve never wanted another child.” He’d never wanted a child, period. “I’m not going to say I’ll _never_ have one, but if I do, it will be a long time from now.”

“Oh.” Sans’ shoulders slump in disappointment.

“But I think I may know how to make you feel better,” Gaster says, reaching out to tweak his nasal bones. “Just sit tight. Let me do some thinking. In the meantime—” He pushes away his notes, standing up. His job as the Royal Scientist is important, but his job as a father is infinitely moreso. “—how about we go play catch outside?”

* * *

“So, what kind of personality were you looking for?” Micha asks, rubbing her pincers together. “Sweet and cuddly, smart and active, anything in particular?”

“Er—well, I’m looking for something smart, certainly. Something friendly, and gentle, too. I’ve got a little boy, and this will be his first pet.”

“Ah.” Micha claps her pincers in excitement. “A dog is a classic start.”

Gaster thinks about it for a moment, then grimaces. A dog is good, of course, but far, far too similar to the Canine Unit and Sans himself. He doesn’t want to know what the pack dynamics would look like with a new, pet-level addition. “Perhaps not. A dog is just a bit too rowdy, I think, and we live in Snowdin, so I don’t know how the Canine Unit would take to it.”

Micha nods knowingly, humming in thought. “And a cat wouldn’t be a very engaging companion, for a child. They’re charming in their own right, but I doubt they’d offer the company you’re looking for. Many of them can’t handle such, er—enthusiasm. I doubt you’d want a fish or a bird, either. Or would you want a bird? They’re intelligent, and usually quite sweet.”

Gaster rocks on his heels, but something about feathers makes him...uneasy. “They’re very long-lived, though, aren’t they? I don’t know that Sans is going to want something he’ll have to take with him through so much of his adult life.”

“Hmmm.” Micha taps her chin, her carapace clicking. Her eyes brighten, suddenly. “Aha! Smart, friendly, short-lived—I have _just_ the thing. Follow me.”

Micha leads him between a set of steel doors and farther into the shelter, past rows of snoozing cats. He has to admit, he’s tempted. A cat seems like a perfect pet for himself—but this is for Sans, and Gaster doesn’t have time for a pet, anyway. (Well, not more than one—he’s perfectly aware that he’ll be the one responsible for Sans’ pet since, you know, Sans is _four.)_ They stop in front of a large, vertical cage stuffed with small hammocks, water bottles, feed dishes, and chewing toys. Gaster bends to peer inside.

“Oh,” he says. There, curled up in one of the hammocks, is a large gray rat. 

“That one is Remy,” Micha says. “He’s a year old, and they usually only live to be three. He’s a sweetheart—very friendly, very social, and he’s not a biter. He’s used to being handled, and he already knows a few tricks. Now, these two down here—” She kneels, gesturing to a pair of cream-colored rats. “Hanna and Lily. They’re not quite as well-socialized, but they’re younger, and easily adaptable. We have a litter of babies in the back, too, if you’re interested in seeing those.”

“No,” Gaster says, his eyesockets all for the sleepy gray rat in the hammock. “May I hold Remy?”

Micha grins the grin of a victorious salesperson and reaches in to scoop Remy up. She deposits him in Gaster’s hands, and the rat immediately snakes itself through the hole in his palm. Gaster tries his best not to snicker, but that _tickles,_ damn it. The rat scurries up his arm, sniffing curiously, his little hands holding tightly to Gaster’s bones. He reaches Gaster’s shoulder, snuffling around his neck, and Gaster hunches his shoulders and grins.

“He is a friendly guy, isn’t he?” Gaster asks, and Remy squeaks his agreement, his tail pinwheeling to keep his balance as he scurries down Gaster’s other arm. “He knows tricks, you said?”

“He certainly does.” Micha gently takes Remy, setting him back in the cage. He braces himself on the ledge of the door, standing up on two feet and leaning earnestly in her direction. “Remy, sit.” Remy sits. “Remy, stand.” Remy stands. “Remy, go ‘round.” Remy runs in a circle, and receives a treat for his valiant efforts. “As you can see, he’s very clever, and highly trainable. So?” She arches an eyebrow at him. “You interested?”

Almost an hour later, Gaster slips back into his house, a boxful of rat in his arms. He quickly sets up the cage he’d purchased at the shelter, then releases Remy inside. The rat immediately takes off, sniffing around his new home curiously, and Gaster sits back on his heels, quite satisfied. Sans is going to love this. Gaster trots back out of the house, eager to get to Alphys’ to retrieve his son.

“A surprise?” Sans asks when Gaster tells him. Their boots crunch in the snow as they head back towards their house. “For me?”

“Mm-hm,” Gaster says, trying his best not to wiggle with excitement. He can’t stop a _little_ hand-flap, though. “I think you’re going to like it. Here—it’s in your room.”

Sans jogs up the stairs, a wide grin on his face. Gaster follows almost as quickly, unwilling to miss the glee on his son’s face when he meets his new pet. The two of them step into Sans’ room, and Sans races to the cage, his eyelights searching eagerly for its occupant. Remy bounds to the front, sniff-sniff-sniffing, and Sans actually, legitimately squeals.

“A pet! You got me a pet? It’s mine, for real?”

“He’s yours,” Gaster says, crouching next to his son. “I’ll help you take care of him, though. His name is Remy, and he’s very friendly. Would you like to hold him?”

Sans nods so fast that Gaster is surprised his head doesn’t fall off. 

Gaster unlatches the cage, reaching inside and allowing Remy to hop into his palm. He brings him out, offering him to Sans. “Keep him close to your chest, but don’t squeeze him. He likes to climb on you.”

Sans holds very, very still as Remy is deposited into his hands. The rat sniffs along his chest, then begins to scale his arm, much like he’d done to Gaster at the shelter. Sans giggles. His smile is wide enough to squeeze his eyes shut. “Oh my gosh, thank you, thank you, thank you, _thank you Dad I love him—”_ He squeaks as Remy nibbles his jaw, hunching his shoulders. “Hey there, buddy. It’s nice to meet you. You’re really, heh, really tickly. He feels like Asgore.”

“Ha—he kinda does, doesn’t he? Furry mammals.”

“How do I take care of him?” Sans asks, carefully scooping Remy back into hands and petting the rat’s back with one little finger.

“Well, he’ll need you to play with him every day. Think you can manage that?”

Sans nods quickly. “Uh-huh.”

“He’ll also need fresh food and water every day. I can help you with that. I’ll take care of changing his litter and cleaning his cage, too, so you don’t need to worry about it. Just give him lots of attention, okay? He can learn tricks, too.”

“Really?”

“Certainly. Rats are very intelligent creatures.”

“Awesome,” Sans breathes. “He’s so awesome.”

“That he is,” Gaster says, resting a hand on Sans’ head. He thinks, briefly, of the lab rats—white fur and red eyes and running mazes. What is the difference between a pet and a tool? A tool and a monster? Is there a difference? ...does it matter? He stands up. “Would you like to come downstairs with me? You can bring him, too. Just be gentle carrying him."

“I will,” Sans says—and, looking at the ginger way he handles Remy, Gaster believes him. His son is a gentle creature.

Funny, how badly Gaster screwed up on his own lab rat. He was never meant to be gentle.

* * *

_What was your dad like?_

_What?_ Gaster blinks at Grillby, a handful of fries halfway to his mouth. 

_Your dad. What was he like? I’ve never heard you talk about him, but you had to learn this parenting thing from_ someone. _You’re good at it._

_Aw—you think?_

_Of course._

_I learned from my mom, mostly._ He swallows his fries, sitting back on his stool. _And Asgore. And you._

Grillby glances away, flickering a menagerie of yellows and pinks.

_But my dad? Mm, not so much. He wasn’t around. He showed up, wooed my mom for a few years, spawned nine kids and then took off again. I don’t remember him at all. I only remember what Mom told me—and that wasn’t very much. Hell, I don’t even know the guy’s name. Apparently he was some sort of badass soldier, and—_

_Well, I can tell you there’s nothing badass about a man who won’t raise his own children,_ Grillby says, his flames dimming and flashing red.

_I guess not._ Gaster shrugs. _It wasn’t like he was terrible, though. Mom said he really loved her—for a little while, anyway. But maybe that was just something she told herself. I don’t know. I was, like, two when he left._

_Nine kids, you said?_

_Yeah, I know. Excessive. Nobody needs that many kids. Even two is weird. I mean, necessary, I guess, to keep the population stable, but—ugh. Kids._

_You realize you have a kid, right?_

_Yes. It’s weird._

_...good weird?_

_Oh, absolutely, but I wouldn’t do it again. I certainly wouldn’t do it nine times. One person can’t raise nine kids—two can barely manage it. You always end up forcing your oldest kids to look after your youngest. My big sister took care of me more often than my mom did—not that I blame her. I mean, she was busy as hell. Being a single parent is hard._

_How did your parents support so many souls? Skeletons aren’t exactly known for being, er, prolific. That’s why they’re all so powerful, isn’t it? Keep the offspring few and give them all as much power as you can._

_That’s the ideal,_ Gaster agrees.

_But your parents didn’t do that. How come you’ve still got so much magic?_

Gaster shrugs. _Who knows? I know my mother was running low on soulmagic, by the time she had my little sister, but maybe my father was some sort of magical powerhouse. What does it matter?_

_I suppose it doesn’t. I’m only curious._ Grillby pours him a refill of steaming tea. _You’ve never spoken about him before. I wanted to know why._

_Well, there you have it. I don’t know anything about him. What about you? Your dad? What was he like?_

_He was wonderful._ A smile flickers across Grillby’s face. _All of my parents were. I was very lucky._

_You had three, right?_

_Mm-hm. Two mothers and a father. I lived with them all, along with my twin sister._

_The one you fought alongside in the war?_

_The same._

_I’m sorry. She died, didn’t she?_

Grillby nods, sipping on his own mug of coffee. _So she did. It was a courageous and worthwhile death, though that brings little enough comfort. For what it’s worth—_

Sans skids through the bar’s door, lunging onto the bar and then over it. His tail barely misses Gaster’s mug, and Gaster hisses and pulls it protectively to his chest. Sans curls around Grillby’s feet, shushing Gaster furiously when he tries to speak. “Shh! Shh-shh-shh—”

Fuku bounds in after him—she’s twisted her flame to match his form, turning herself into a glowing green blaster with embers for eyes. She pants for breath, her tail wagging furiously. Gaster covers his smile with a hand, swirling his tea in his mug. Fuku prowls across the floor, her pawsteps quiet and careful. When she finds Sans, they both squeal in excitement before taking off again. Gaster and Grillby look fondly after them. It’s good to see them playing together again, although they certainly don’t do it as much as they used to.

_Kids,_ Grillby signs.

“Kids,” Gaster agrees, sighing happily.

* * *

Gaster learns something staggering about four-year-olds, in the heart of a blizzard. He and Sans are eating lunch at Grillby’s—most of the townspeople do, when it’s so dreary outside. The warmth and light of the bar are bolstering. Gaster chows down on a basket of sweet potato fries while Sans wolfs down a cheeseburger with exactly eight-ninths of a ketchup bottle squirted onto it. He sneaks Remy (who is huddled in the pocket of his jacket) bites of the tomato on his burger.

What Gaster learn is that four-year-olds? Four-year-olds don’t keep secrets.

_Gaster?_ Grillby signs. _Once you’re done eating, may I speak to you for a moment?_

Gaster hurriedly bolts down the last few of his fries, wiping marshmallow dip off of his fingers before standing. _You certainly can. Sans?_

“Mm?” Sans asks through a mouthful of burger.

_Stay right there. I’ll be back in just a few moments._

Sans flashes him a thumbs-up. 

As Gaster passes the dogs to skirt the bar, he sets a hand on Greater’s shoulder. “Could you all just kind of…?”

“Keep an eye on him?” Dogaressa suggests. 

“You got it, chief,” Dogamy agrees, wagging his tail.

Gaster follows Grillby to the back room, where the elemental takes a seat at a table and motions for Gaster to do the same. Gaster readily obeys. _What do you need to talk about?_ he signs. 

_Nothing bad, I should think,_ Grillby says. _I’m sure there’s an explanation._

_Ah. Anything that warrants an explanation sounds...not so good._

_I heard the strangest thing from Fuku the other day._

_Did you?_

_Yes. The said that she’d been talking with Sans, and that he said he didn’t have a mother because his daddy created him all on his own. Did you tell him that? I understand if you were trying to spare his feelings, but Gaster—the boy deserves to know what happened to his mother._

Gaster feels very, very foolish all of a sudden. Of course Sans wouldn’t keep that a secret. He’s four—and Gaster didn’t even tell him to. What was he expecting? _I—ah. There is an explanation._

_I’m glad to hear it._

_It’s—_ He scratches the back of his neck nervously. _Kind of a long one._

_We have time. Sans still had half a burger to go. I’ll bring him dessert, if I need to. On the house._

Gaster sighs, sitting back in his chair. _You’re going to hate me for this._

_Is it that bad?_ The edges of Grillby’s flames crackle smokey gray with discomfort.

Gaster squirms. _It’s—okay. So. This is—kind of a secret? Please don’t tell Sans what I’m about to tell you._

Grillby gets smokier. 

_Grillby, please? I can’t tell you unless you promise not to tell him. I’ll tell him, I will, once he’s older, he’s just—too little to understand yet._

_...very well,_ Grillby grudgingly agrees. _I won’t tell him, unless I think it puts you or him in danger._

Gaster has to be satisfied with that. _Well—alright. So quite a while ago, King Asgore asked me to design a weapon that could kill any humans that fell into the Underground. My blasters seemed like the perfect reference, so—_

_...so that’s why Sans has their form._

_You catch on quickly._ Gaster inclines his head. _Sans was based off of blaster DNA, yes. I isolated the blaster phenotype from my own DNA and activated it to create a baby blaster. That was five years ago—almost six, now. For the first eighteen months, the blaster grew in the lab. Then I realized that it—that_ he _—could talk, and think, and feel. Asgore and I scrapped the project, because using Sans as a weapon—_

He shakes his head. _I can’t even imagine it now. It was extremely unethical. The only problem was that I hadn’t created a soul for Sans—just a body. So I gave him some of my own soul, and now he’s growing normally. See? Not a big deal. I just don’t want Sans to start thinking he’s dangerous, or a weapon, or something like that. I just want him to be a kid. I want him to have a normal life._

Grillby is eerily quiet.

_...Grillby? Are you upset?_

_Then there is no other parent. There is no_ she. _You lied to me._

Gaster cringes. _I—yes. I didn’t want you to think badly of Sans._

_You didn’t want me think badly of_ you, Grillby signs sharply. 

_...that either. I’m sorry, for what it’s worth._

_You’ve let me believe a lie for_ years, _Gaster. I thought you trusted me._

_I do! I do trust you. Maybe—maybe in the beginning I didn’t, but that’s not your fault. It’s mine. I should have told you, I know that, but I didn’t—I didn’t want you to think of me as a liar._

_Oh? And what am I supposed to think of you now? Were you simply planning on never telling me? On letting me believe a lie for the rest of our lives?_

Gaster shrinks into himself. Yes, actually. That would have been the ideal situation, although it makes him sick with guilt to think about it. _I—I don’t know. Why does it matter so much?_

_Because we’re_ friends! _You—you made me feel_ sorry _for you. I thought you’d lost someone, I thought you’d been abandoned with a child, but you don’t have the slightest idea what that grief feels like. Not all of us are fortunate enough to get to lie about our loss._ Grillby’s flames crackle red at the edges, the heat around him rising. 

_You’re angry with me._

_Yes, Gaster. I’m angry with you._

Gaster shifts his weight anxiously. _I’m sorry. I don’t know how to make it better. How do you—what do you want me to say? To do? I don’t want you to be mad at me._

Grillby brings a hand to his forehead. _Sometimes you’re so naive._

_I’m sorry._

_Never mind. I just—need time to think. As soon as Sans is finished eating, please leave. I would rather you didn’t come back tomorrow, or the next day._

Gaster cannot possibly feel any lower. He is shit on Satan’s bootheel. _Of course. Whatever you want._

He slinks out of Grillby’s like a kicked dog, Sans’ hand curled tightly around his. The air feels colder. Frost clings to his soul. 

“Dad?”

“Yes, Sans?”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, Sans. Don’t worry about it.”

“You’re lying.”

“I’m very good at that, aren’t I?” A bitter smile twists his mouth. “Nevertheless, it will be alright. If I need your help, I’ll tell you—and rest assured, that isn’t a lie.”

Sans frowns, his fingers tightening around Gaster’s. “I—okay. I guess.” He doesn’t sound happy. Remy’s head peeks out of his scarf, beady black eyes studying him carefully. “You promise?”

Gaster rests a hand on his skull. “I promise.”

* * *

They don’t go back to Grillby’s for a week—and when they do, it’s only because Sans has been whining about how Gaster’s hamburgers aren’t as good as Grillby’s. He’s not wrong. There’s something about free-range fire that really elevates the whole palate. Despite that, facing Grillby is the last thing Gaster wants to do. The elemental asked for space and time, and that’s just what Gaster wants to give him.

Besides, his ego is wounded, and even stepping inside the bar floods him with shame.

Sans has no such feelings. “Hi, Grillby!” he says, practically skipping into the bar and dragging Gaster behind him. Grillby pops yellow at the edges. Surprise? Fear? ...Gaster wishes he knew which one it was.

_Hello there, Sans. Welcome back._

Sans climbs onto the barstool, swinging his feet. “Thanks. My dad didn’t wanna come, but I made him.”

Gaster desperately studies the floor. He doesn’t want to know what Grillby’s reply is. 

“Can I get pierogies, please?” 

“Can you get what?” Gaster aks, baffled. Sans always gets a hamburger. Always.

“Pierogies. They’re on the menu. They sound good. Are they good, Grillby?”

_I make them._

“See? So they have to be good. Grillby’s the best chef in the Underground,” Sans says.

_Fries for you, Gaster?_

“Yes. Please. Regular.”

“How come you always get fries?” Sans asks, slurping happily at the chocolate milk Grillby slides him.

“It’s a texture thing.”

They both dig into their food once Grillby slides it onto the bar. Gaster eats as quickly as he can, eager to be out of the bar, but Sans is in no such rush—for once, he lingers over his meal, eating in little bites. 

“What’s the matter?” Gaster asks. “Don’t you like it?”

“Yeah, it’s great,” Sans says. “I’m _savoring,_ here. You can’t rush perfection.”

Gaster rubs his face. 

_Tap tap tap._ Grillby’s finger, on the table, summoning his attention. He reluctantly lifts his eyes. _Would you like to step outside with me for a moment?_

Absolutely he would not like that—still, he rises to his feet, trying not to look like he’s about to be scolded within an inch of his life. (Not that he doesn’t deserve it.) Sans offers him a knowing look but doesn’t protest, the little _traitor._ He just shoves another pierogi into his mouth, chewing slowly and pointedly. “Have fun, Dad.”

Gaster’s eye twitches.

The outside air is warmer than usual, when Gaster stands next to Grillby. He’s tempted to move closer, but he resists the urge—Grillby wanted space, and Gaster has no right to deny him that. So he stands, his head bowed, and he watches Grillby’s hands in his peripheral vision. Grillby turns to face him.

_I understand why you did what you did,_ he signs. _Although that doesn’t make it any more right, and it doesn’t make me any happier. But I know you only wanted a normal life for you and Sans. I wish that you could have trusted me to be a part of that life, even knowing what I know now. What did you think I would do if I knew? Shun you? You made a mistake, Gaster. It happens._

“I tried to create a weapon,” Gaster says, his voice hollow and his hands stiff as he signs. “I tried to create a beast for the sole purpose of maiming and slaughtering others. Instead, I created a child.”

_It doesn’t matter. You’ve done what you’ve done. Nothing can change that. So why—why couldn’t you trust me to understand?_

“I thought that if you knew, that if—anyone but Asgore and Alphys and I knew, you’d all think I was a bad person.” He shrugs. “Hell. Maybe I am. I just—wanted to pretend I wasn’t, for a little while. I wanted to be a normal person—a normal _father,_ and normal fathers don’t create their babies in test tubes for the sole purpose of hunting and killing mankind. But who am I kidding? I could never be a normal father. It was foolish to try—but Sans, he still has a _chance._ He can be normal. He can be _happy.”_

_And what makes you think he won’t be, if he knew why you created him?_

“Because then he would think of himself as a weapon, as a mistake. I don’t want him to think that.”

_How do you know he would? Have you given him any reason to believe that?_

“Stars, I hope not. Making him was a mistake, but he— _he_ is not a mistake, and he never will be. I’m just afraid he won’t understand that. At least not until he’s older.”

_And what about me? Did you think I would see him as a weapon?_

“I didn’t know,” Gaster admits. “I didn’t know how you would react.”

_Could you not have simply told me that you didn’t want to talk about it? Did you have to imply a significant other than never existed? I—I felt for you, Gaster. I thought you were grieving._

_I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said there was someone else involved, but I—panicked, the first time. And once you make a lie, you have to follow through._

_You don’t have to._

_...no. I suppose you don’t._

_But you didn’t want me to see you as a bad person. You valued my impression of you more than my trust_ in _you. Is your ego really so important?_

Gaster shuffles his feet uncomfortably.

_Well._ Grillby shrugs. _Who am I to talk about egos? All of this to say, Gaster—I think you’re a good person._

Gaster’s head jerks up.

_Yes. I do,_ Grillby repeats. _You’re a good person, Wingdings Gaster. A good person and a very good father. I don’t trust you, but I don’t intend to abandon our friendship so easily. We’ve all made mistakes. I forgive you, but I would prefer it if you didn’t lie to me again._

“Heh.” Gaster’s throat feels tight. His eyes sting. “Yeah. Yes, yeah, I think I can manage that.”

_Good. In that case—_ Grillby extends an arm, flickering warmly. _Come here?_

Gaster goes there. He tucks himself against Grillby’s side, basking in his warmth, and Grillby hugs him tightly. _Thank you,_ Gaster signs, again and again. _Thank you, thank you._

And if a tear or two sizzles against Grillby’s shoulder—well, he doesn’t complain.

Sans finishes his pierogi remarkably quickly, after that. 

_I’ve been meaning to ask you both something, actually,_ Grillby says, just before they go. 

“Yeah?” Sans says, pushing up eagerly onto his toes.

_We’re having a controlled burn at Ms. Hatcher’s farm tomorrow morning. I’ll be teaching Fuku how to participate, but I thought Sans might enjoy learning about the burns, too._

_Burns?_ Sans signs curiously.

_Yes. Would you like to come see? I will explain more there._

_Yes! Can we, Dad? Please?_

_I don’t see why not. It’s an interesting event, to be certain. Ms. Hatcher’s, you said? The one in Waterfall?_

_Yes, the same._

_We’ll be there,_ Gaster signs. _Have a good evening, Grillby._

* * *

They’re up bright and early the next morning—well, _Gaster_ is up, and making a valiant effort to feed and clothe his half-sleeping child. Sans whines anytime he’s woken earlier than nine, and today is no exception. It’s only after Gaster gets a piece of French toast in front him that he starts to perk up, rubbing his eyes and asking about controlled burns. Gaster, for once, brushes his questions off. 

“Grillby will explain,” he says. “Just eat your food so we won’t be late.”

They are late, a little bit, but not by much—and only because Sans couldn’t decide which jacket he wanted to wear. When they arrive at Ms. Hatcher’s farm, they find Grillby and Fuku in the stall barn, chatting amiably with Ms. Hatcher and sipping coffee. 

_Ah, there you two are,_ Grillby signs, turning to face them. _Ms. Hatcher, these are my friends, Dr. Gaster and his son, Sans. They’ve come to watch the burn._

“Oh, it is an exciting thing to watch, the first twenty times,” Ms. Hatcher says, smoothing a paw over her whiskers. “How I envy you younglings.”

_Hi, Dr. Gaster. Hi, Sans,_ Fuku signs, and Sans beams and signs his greeting back at her. 

“Well, I should let you get to it,” Ms. Hatcher says, gathering up the elementals’ empty coffee mugs. “I’ll be in the tack room if you need me—there’s leather needs cleaning. But just hollar, or shoot a flame up, and I’ll be right there.”

Grillby leads the way out of the barn and into a sprawling field surrounded by wire fencing. The growing season has long since ended, and most of the spent crops lay dry and wilted on the dirt. The weeds sprout abundantly between them. The artificial lights above them swing gently in the breeze.

“So,” Sans says, practically vibrating with excitement, _“now_ do I get to know what a burn is?”

_Yes,_ Grillby says, crouching next to him. _A controlled burn is something that I—and many fire elementals—assist farmers with. We go into their fields when their crops aren’t growing, and we burn everything up._

Sans frowns. _How come?_

_Lots of reasons. See all those dead plants out there?_

Sans nods.

_Well, they have lots of nutrients in them—but it’s hard for those nutrients to go back into the soil when they’re still in the plant’s body. So we burn up all the plants to help their nutrients return to the soil, which makes the land healthy, so they can grow even better crops next year. Some kinds of seeds also have thick resin coats, and they only sprout plants after they’ve been burned. It also helps get rid of all the weeds—the plants that the farmers don’t want—without using harsh chemicals. That’s especially important in Waterfall, because of all the groundwater. We don’t want icky chemicals seeping into that water, because then we might accidentally drink them. Does that make sense?_

“Mm-hm!” Sans nods earnestly. _That’s really cool, actually._

_It is. Plus, it’s fun for us. This will be Fuku’s first time._

_Yeah!_ Fuku crackles in excitement. _Little elementals don’t get to do it because they don’t have as much control, but I’m_ awesome _I’m controlling myself now, even when I get bigger._

_Yes, you are,_ Grillby agrees fondly, ruffling the flames at the top of her head. 

“Well, I suppose we should get out of your way while you work,” Gaster says, setting a hand on Sans’ shoulder. “Shall we wait in the barn?”

_Nonsense. You can stay here. We won’t burn you,_ Grillby says. 

“Really?” Sans practically squeals, balling up his little fists in excitement. 

Grillby chuckles. _Yes, really, little one. Just stay near your daddy, and away from the white flames, alright?_

_White flames are a no!_ Sans agrees. _Got it._

_Very good. In that case—_ Grillby graciously extends an arm. _You first, Fuku. Start from the north end of the field and work towards the center. I’ll start from the south, and we’ll meet in the middle. If you need to take a break at any time, please do. There’s no rush._

_Okie dokie!_ Fuku runs to the far end of the field, her flames lashing in her eagerness. Grillby paces more sedately towards the opposite end. Gaster and Sans remain in the middle. Even Gaster has to admit that this is a fascinating process—he’s never seen a burn in real life before, though he’s seen videos and read articles on the subject. He knows _vaguely_ what to expect— but it still surprises him when Grillby loses his vaguely humanoid shape, flaring into a bonfire slightly larger than Gaster himself. The field begins to smoke.

“Woah,” Sans whispers. “He can change shape too?”

“What, did you think only Fuku could?” Gaster chuckles. “Fire has no shape, little one, but—it is strange to see them when they don’t look like bipeds, isn’t it?”

Slowly, as they consume more and more of the debris on the ground, the elementals grow larger—and closer. By the time they reach the center of the field, they’re blazing infernos. Smoke roils in the air above them, and Gaster can see heatwaves shimmering above the ground. Never once does that heat touch them, though. The wall of fire around them is nothing but bright, comforting heat. 

“That’s so neat,” Sans says, reaching out to touch Grillby’s flames as he towers above and around them. The flames engulf his hand—gently, gently, and Sans’ eyes shine with delight. “Grillby, you’re _awesome.”_

The fire flickers pink around the edges. Gaster grins, and he lets the flames wash over them.

Once the burn has finished and the field is nothing but ash and soot, Grillby and Fuku spend a few moments recollecting themselves. When they can maintain a biped form once again, they lead Sans and Gaster to the tack room. As Grillby speaks with Ms. Hatcher, Sans and Fuku drift inevitably towards the stalls. 

_Here, look._ Fuku scoops Sans up, allowing him to see over the stall door. A stocky draft horse peers back at him, and Sans’ eyes widen.

“Hi,” he says. The horse snorts a blast of warm air into his face and he giggles.

“That’s Molly,” Ms. Hatcher says, wiping her hands off on a rag as she exits the tack room. “She’s a sweetheart. Say, have you kids ever ridden before?”

Somehow, Sans’ eyes get even larger. “Nuh-uh. Can we?”

“I don’t see why not.”

Fuku sets Sans down, bouncing with excitement. _Oh my god, really? How do we do it?_

“Well, come with me and I’ll show you how we get Tanner ready for a ride. If that’s alright with your dads, I mean.” Ms. Hatcher glances back at them. Two sets of puppy-dog eyes follow suit. 

“Well,” Gaster says, shifting nervously. Sans is—a bit young for that, he thinks. A bit small. What if he fell off? What if he was thrown? What if the horse accidentally steps on his little bones? “I’m—not sure.”

“Daaaad, pleeeease?” Sans asks, clasping his hands together. “I’ll be fine.”

_They’ll be fine,_ Grillby seconds, setting a hand on his shoulder. _Let him have some fun. I’m sure Ms. Hatcher won’t put them on a spooky horse._

“Certainly not—you couldn’t spook ole Tanner if you tried. He’s the steadiest fellow we’ve got. I’ll even walk him along, and you can ride with him, if you’d like.”

“Oh, I suppose,” Gaster finally relents. Peer pressure. It really gets to him. 

The children cheer and bound off behind Ms. Hatcher as she heads for a far stall. She leads a sturdy bay pinto out and hooks him up to the crossties, carefully directing the children away from his hind legs. Gaster and Grillby lounge on a couple of overturned five-gallon buckets as the children earnestly help Ms. Hatcher groom Tanner. Sans can only reach the horse’s legs and belly, but damn if he doesn’t brush them as thoroughly as he knows how. Once the horse is groomed, Ms. Hatcher shows them how to tack him up. Sans watches each step with rapt attention, as he does when he learns anything new. 

“Alright,” Ms. Hatcher says, stepping back. “Who wants to go first?”

Fuku’s hand darts into the air, and Sans doesn’t fight her about it. Instead, he drifts over to sit on Gaster’s knee as Ms. Hatcher helps Fuku mount and gather up the reins. One quick riding lesson later, and Fuku walks the horse around the yard on her own, her flames flushed even greener than usual in her joy. When she returns to the barn, Sans is up and ready to go.

“C’mon, Dad,” he says, tugging Gaster’s hand. “It’s our turn, c’mon.”

“Oh, boy.” Gaster (rather clumsily) clambers onto Tanner’s back, gripping the saddle horn tightly. Ms. Hatcher lifts Sans up and sets him down in front of Gaster. He winds his little fingers through the horse’s wiry mane, wiggling with excitement. 

“Ease up with your legs, there,” Ms. Hatcher says, tapping Gaster’s fibula. He jumps but does readily ease up with his legs. “Just relax. Sit straight. Here’s your reins. Now, here’s how you tell him what to do…”

She quickly explains leg signals and neck reining to him, and he nods and clutches the reins with one hand and his son with the other. 

“Now, you feel free to take him on down the road, if you like. We got a pretty view of the river. Then you can turn him right back around and come here, and I’ll help you untack him.”

Gaster quite nervously urges the horse out of the barn, his fingers curled desperately around the reins. Most horses weigh up to a thousand pounds—he is well aware of how easily a thousand pounds can break his bones. He is even more aware of how easily a thousand pounds can break _Sans’_ bones. Flies buzz incessantly around them, draw by the damp heat of the horse’s body—and because, you know, this is western _Waterfall,_ home of perfect fly breeding conditions. Everything smells like sweat and fur and manure. This awful. This is just...distinctly awful. 

“This is _awesome,”_ Sans decides. “Can I have a horse, Dad?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Awww, why not?”

“Where would you keep it? The shed?”

“Well…”

“No.” Tanner stumbles on a rock and Gaster yelps, grabbing the saddle horn. The horse sighs at him. Gaster is 100% sure that was passive-aggression. 

“Dad, relax,” Sans says, snickering. “No wonder you hate it. You’re too scared.”

“Well, one of us has to be.”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Uh- _huh.”_

“Wait—what’s that?” Sans points.

“A tree.”

Sans gives him a withering look. “No way.”

“If you mean what’s _on_ the tree, then it looks like claw marks.” Gaster carefully guides Tanner closer to the tree, reaching out to run his fingers across the torn bark—four deep gouges mar its surface, level with Gaster’s eyeline. Whatever did this wasn’t small.

“What made it?”

“A bear, probably. Maybe a mountain lion, although these look a bit deep for that.”

“They’re really high up.”

“Well, bears do get big.”

_“That_ big? Belous isn’t that big.”

“Belous is a monster, not an animal.”

“So animal bears are bigger than monster bears?”

“Typically, yes.”

“Huh.” Sans touches the claw marks, then leans forward, sniffing. Gaster grips him around the spine to keep him from toppling off of Tanner’s back.

“Be careful. Don’t lean too far.”

“It smells funny.”

“Like a bear?”

“I dunno what a bear smells like, if it’s not like Belous. Maybe. Whatever it is, it smells angry.” Sans shivers.

“Well, let’s not stick around, then. Fighting a territorial bear on horseback wasn’t in my agenda for the day.” 

“Woah, look who’s been practicing sarcasm.”

“Oh, hush, you.” Gaster gently turns Tanner back towards the barn, nudging him down the trail. The forest falls away behind them, dark and deep and quiet.

* * *

“You telling me the kid needs _more_ clothes? I just made him some two months ago!” Thresh protests, their tail lashing. “What he doing, eating them?”

“No, just—growing,” Gaster says, grimacing. “He’s a fast grower—well, his blaster form is, anyway—and he just turned five. He’s got a few years of growing left.”

“You don’t have to remind me,” Thresh grumbles, jotting down Gaster’s order. “Whatever. You are half my income, I indulge you.”

“We’re very grateful.”

“As you should be.” They point a finely-filed talon in his direction. “Needy. Needy skeletons, that’s what you are. Why skeletons wear clothes, anyway? You got nothing to hide! All bone! You tell that boy stop growing. I am having hard enough time finding fabric as is.”

“Are you?”

“I am, as a matter fact. Every time I go to dump, I find less and less human scraps. I do not know where they are going.” Thresh flings their hands into the air. “Ridiculous! What am I gonna tailor, without human fabrics? There’s only so much cotton can be produced down here, only so many sheep to be shorn.”

“I’m sorry to hear it. I’m afraid I don’t expect Sans to stop growing anytime soon, though.”

Thresh groans.

“What can I say?” Gaster smiles sheepishly. “Blasters are big.”

“Not as big as your nerve, showin’ up here to torment me like this—go on, get out, you. I make your clothes, then don’t wanna see you for another three months, at least. At least!”

* * *

“Dad! Look! Look—”

Gaster makes the unfortunate decision to look. Sans beams at him from across the kitchen. There’s a rat head poking from his eyesocket. “Stars help me,” he whispers. “Son. Get the rat out of your skull.”

Sans runs away, cackling. 

A few minutes later, once Gaster has finally caught him, wrestled Remy out of his skull, and spritzed disinfectant into both eyesockets (which sends Sans into a giggling fit—apparently it tickles), the two of them sprawl on the couch. Gaster decides he’s birthed Chaos reincarnate. 

“What can I say?” Sans says, winking. (Where the hell did he learn to wink? Gaster blames Asgore.) “I just had somethin’ _rat_ tling around in my thoughts.”

That tone is a Bad Joke Tone, so Gaster groans.

“Hey, I’m your b _rat._ You created me.”

“Uuuuugh. My god. Stop.”

“Bud, you gotta look on the bright side. All’s well _rat_ ends well.”

Gaster buries his face in the couch cushions. 

“Eh, maybe you’re right. These jokes are gettin’ kinda er _rat_ ic, huh?”

Gaster snorts, at that one—then he shoots his son a glare. “Why are you so good at these? I certainly didn’t teach you.”

“Natural talent. What can I say? I’m a punny guy.” Sans grins at him, his eyes shining. He scoots closer to Gaster, cuddling underneath his arm and yawning.

“Tired, Mr. Punny Guy?”

“Mm, maybe just a little.” He rubs one eye with a tiny fist. “Hey, um—do you ever feel like something’s...missing?”

Gaster studies the hole in his palm. “Sometimes, I suppose. It never lasts. Why?”

“I dunno. I just—” He fumbles with his hands, like he’s trying to find a sign for a word he doesn’t know. “Sometimes I feel like there’s something else that’s supposed to be here. Like if there were just one more thing, then everything would be complete. Almost like a—a puzzle, but a really important piece is missing.”

Gaster frowns. “...maybe you’re hungry?”

“Yeah.” Sans chews his thumb gently. “Maybe that’s it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !! if anyone's interested, i went ahead and started making an 8tracks playlist for this fic! it's not completely done, so it'll be updated along with the fic. [here's the link!](https://8tracks.com/parsnipit/algernon)
> 
> fun fact: remy is named that because of,,,rem sleep,,,


	10. tap, tap

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: severe child abuse (both physical and emotional), child neglect, extremely unethical experimentation (that more or less amounts to torture), references to the murders of multiple children, experimental surgery**
> 
> also as much as i would love to give you guys a _Flowers for Algernon_ quote for every chapter, there are,,,too many chapters and not enough quotes,,,so alas we won't have any more quotes until we reach our concluding arc. also if you skipped those warnings plz go back up and read them, there's some dark dark stuff in this one. 
> 
> on the bright side, the moment you've all been waiting for, the one!! the only!! the great papyrus!!!

On August 12th, GBP134 is created. It isn’t large, at first—merely a blob of white magic and DNA, hardly bigger than a single cell and visible only underneath a microscope’s scratched lens. Its creator keeps it in a small vial of DT/M50. His first thirty attempts at creating a blaster had all died within their first month of life, due to concentrations of the solution that were either too much or too unstable. Mistakes like that are inexcusable. A waste of time.

The next 134 beasts had survived long enough to be labelled. Some died shortly after they were removed from solution. Some died in their first year of life, unable to cope with the stresses of their existence. Some died due to unforeseen experimental consequences—but 134 will grow to be useful. He’s determined that it will.

So it sits in an incubator in the basement, in a row of fifteen identical test tubes, and it grows.

It makes it through the first month.

The second month he can see it with the naked eye. It’s still not large—hardly bigger than a pencil eraser, but it’s there. That’s something.

The third month it’s even larger. Six inches from crown to tail-tip. Its bones begin to form. Its femur reminds him of glass, fragile and easily shattered. Its ribs encircle the hollow, soulless darkness of its chest cavity. Its fangs grow long and sharp. He wishes it would grow even faster; he’s impatient to begin its training.

By the fourth month, it’s twelve inches long, and it’s beginning to move. Its claws curl, its legs stretch, its tail lashes slowly through the solution. He takes sparse notes—he already knows what to expect. He’s done this a few times, now. 134 is nothing special. A few minor modifications to the genome, to sharpen up dull edges and further reduce the risk of any accidental sapience (the last few tries had been too...emotional, for his tastes). Those are the only things that make 134 different from the other 133 attempts. 

In the fifth month, it begins to respond to sounds. He confirms this by playing a high-pitched noise next to its test tube and watching it writhe in discomfort. Good—hearing intact. He would have had to terminate it, otherwise. A deaf creature cannot properly respond to commands on the battlefield. Other than the occasional tests to confirm continuing auditory development, the beast lives in silence.

In the sixth month, eyelights appear. 134 watches everything around it eagerly, its eyes tracking him each time he enters the room. He tests for eyelight responses (all intact), and then ignores it, as best he can. It’s fucking creepy. 

During the seventh month, the beast’s bones harden, and it weighs in at six pounds—bigger, already, than most of the previous blasters at this age. It’s big enough to be removed from the solution. He drains the excess off into a bucket to be reused, then slides the beast out onto the concrete. It squirms, crying pitifully at the shock of being so abruptly removed from solution, and he pushes it into its first cage. 

“You’ll be fine,” he says, tying its ID tag to its cage door. GBP134 — Series 12 — Genome 3A — August 12. He hangs its chart on the hook across from the cage and slides in two bowls, one of solution and one of chicken meal. It will learn to eat and drink on its own, or it will starve. He can’t waste time on any beast stupid enough to starve to death with a meal right in front of it. “I know it feels strange, but it’s harmless. Be quiet now.”

The beast cries all night. Fortunately, he can't hear it. He’s upstairs, researching—he has a Core meeting tomorrow, after all.

At eight months, the beast is seven pounds and sturdier each day. He checks its conformation near the middle of the month. He’s never quite made a blaster that looks identical to Dr. Gaster’s manifested ones, but he passes that off as a mere result of the genetic fiddling he’s been doing. His blasters are very  _ similar  _ to Dr. Gaster’s blasters, but they aren’t identical, of course. Even Sans didn’t look quite like the manifested blasters did. 134 certainly doesn’t, although it’s a good deal closer.

He places 134 on a metal table and sets it on its paws, holding its chin up. It squirms, but he tightens his grip around its jaw and it falls still, whining. It’s a beautiful specimen, in truth. Long and lean, as blasters are meant to be. Its head and muzzle are long and narrow, its fangs even and sharp. Forelimbs are long and perfectly straight, flowing well into powerful shoulders, and the slope of the back curves nicely. Its spines are wickedly sharp and well-set, its tail thin and agile. Hips are even, with long hind legs to help it pounce and sturdy claws to help it grip the ground and run. Chest is a little narrower than he’d like it to be, but nothing that can’t be fixed in the next round. 134 is still a perfectly usable blaster.

“I’d be sorry to lose you,” he tells it, and he means it. The good news is that he still has Genome 3A on file, so if he  _ does  _ lose 134, he can simply create another one. It’s comforting to know. 

He starts 134’s training nine months after its creation.

The first lesson is always the hardest.

Blasters are incredible creatures—it’s why he’s so invested in this project. They’re natural hunters, born with greater grace and power than most monsters could ever dream of possessing. Such power comes at a cost, however. Power like that cannot be allowed to roam free, cannot be allowed to go without impeccably maintained control and conditioning. Most monsters are significantly weaker than a full-grown blaster, and so that control cannot be physical. It must be psychological, and it must start while they’re young. 

One never controls the body of a beast. One only ever controls the mind, and that is enough.

He takes 134 to the conditioning room—a small, bright room with no windows. It stumbles around for a moment, still shaky on its legs. He’s proud that it can even walk; ordinary monster children certainly aren’t staggering around a month before they’re supposed to be born. For a moment, it looks hopefully at him. Its tail wags, and it smiles. It’s already imprinted, of course. He hasn’t quite figured out how to prevent that, but he knows well how to manage it. He reaches for his staff: a sturdy length of golden oak wood. The beast wobbles forward, snuffling curiously at it. That is the first—and last—time it will dare to touch the staff. 

_ Tap, tap.  _ Two gentle strikes of the staff against the ground. The beast tilts its head, warbling curiously.  _ Crack!  _ He slams the staff into the beast’s ribs—a carefully calculated strike, one that will do nothing but bruise. Even so, the force of the blow sends the beast sliding across the floor, shrieking in pain. It twists its head around, as though to lick a wound that isn’t there, its eyes wide and frantic. The first pain it’s felt in its life, he supposes. Certainly not the last.

_ Tap, tap.  _ The beast’s eyes snap to him. He lifts the staff and slams it down on the beast’s spine with another vicious  _ crack.  _ The beast wails, its hind legs scrambling as it tries and fails to flee.

_ Tap, tap.  _ Another blow—this one to the side of its muzzle, hard enough to snap its head around.

_ Tap, tap.  _ The beast turns on the staff as it moves forward, snarling as best it can, and digs its teeth savagely into the wood.

_ Tap, tap.  _ This time the blow breaks the beast’s pelvis. It screams, struggling desperately to prop itself up on its front legs. It snaps frantically at the staff, its teeth clicking and its lower jaw scissoring. 

_ Tap, tap.  _ He smashes the staff down on one of the beast’s paws and hears tiny bones splinter. The beast rolls onto its side, howling—a blaster’s cry for its parents, its littermates. No one comes. 

_ Tap, tap.  _ A sharp blow to its sternum, hard enough to have it coughing. It struggles to show him its belly, its tail tucked tightly between its legs; a submissive gesture. He reaches for the clicker in his pocket.

_ Click.  _ He crouches, resting a hand on the beast’s shoulder. It cries and trembles, but it doesn’t snap at him. As a reward, he offers it his healing magic—welds its bones back together, soothes away its aches and pains. It settles beneath him, panting. When he draws back, it cautiously climbs to its feet. 

_ Tap, tap.  _ It quails, its tail tucking and its head turning away. It isn’t enough.  _ Crack!  _

Fortunately, the beast is a fast learner. It only takes a few blows to have it rolling onto its back again, tail tucked.  _ Click.  _ Another round of healing magic. It doesn’t want to get up again, after that, but he’s a patient man. Within the hour, it stands, watching him warily. 

_ Tap, tap.  _ It drops immediately, rolling onto its back. 

_ Click.  _ A treat, this time—a small bite of hamburger. The beast doesn’t want to eat from his hand. It continues to turn its head away, whimpering quietly. It only accepts the food once he drops it on the floor and walks away. 

Lesson learned, he supposes—for now. They’ll have to reinforce it, of course, so that it’s effective over time and around any and all distractions. That’s a start, though, and he doubts a nine-month-old can handle much more. He returns 134 to its cage, slides it a bowl of chicken meal and solution, and leaves it to rest in the dark and the quiet.

By the time the beast is ten months old, he feels its magic and obedience are stable enough to attempt using the concentrator. He takes the beast out of its first cage—a small, dark area fit for a baby creature—and moves it to its second cage. This second cage is massive, fit for a fully-grown blaster and then some. Inside, he places a bowl of food and solution, as well as a thin rug for the beast to rest on. The bars of this cage are much thicker, interlaced with his own magic to reinforce them.

He allows the beast a day to adapt to the cage. After that day, he takes it down to the surgery room. Once it’s under anesthesia, he ties it down to the table on its belly, so he has full access to the back of its neck and skull. Carefully, he shaves down three of the spines just above its shoulders, creating a flat surface. He takes the concentrator—a small, thin black box—and sets it on the back of the beast’s neck, pressed firmly against the flattened bone. He rocks it some, making sure it sits steadily, and then screws it into the beast’s bone. The screws he uses run deep into the beast’s vertebrae—far deeper than they need to, for such a small creature. But, if all goes well, the beast won’t be this small for long. The screws will need the extra room. Once the concentrator is finally in place, he goes to work on the wires. 

There are three extendable wires—blue, red, and purple. The red wire carries DT, the blue wire carries concentrated magic, and the purple wire carries whatever he wants it to carry. This early in a beast’s training, he always loads it with sedative. The handy thing about skeletons is that there are  _ thousands  _ of places wires can go. He chooses the most obvious one: the spinal canal. He threads the wires through it, all the way from the concentrator to the base of the tail, then cracks the body of each vertebrae open and winds the wires’ thin offshoots deeply into them. He glues them all into place, then connects the far ends of the wires to the concentrator and seals the beast’s spine back together using his magic. Perfect. The beast is groggy when it wakes, and it begins retching miserably, so he decides to give it a day of recovery. He scoops it up and sets it within its adult cage. 

The next day, 134 huddles in the back of aforementioned cage, chewing the base of its tail in agitation. He lifts his staff,  _ tap tap.  _ The beast immediately stops and rolls onto its back.  _ Click,  _ treat. This time, the beast—having figured out their routine, and that it won’t be punished for taking food when it comes after a  _ click _ —snaps the treat up when he tosses it onto the floor. He takes a seat in front of the cage, pulling the concentrator’s remote control out of his pocket. He adjusts the settings—nothing  _ too  _ big, at first—before pressing the start button. 

Immediately, 134 goes rigid, its head snapping up. Its eyelights flicker out, its mouth opening and shutting soundlessly. It lifts one paw over and over, a helpless, repetitive gesture, and then, as the magic finally integrates with its system, it screams. 134 spends several minutes writhing in agony, its bones melting and cracking and shifting spontaneously as they adapt to the surplus of DT/M being forced into them. When its body finally adjusts, adopting a size more fit for the increased amount of magic it possesses, it lays panting in exhaustion. Tears streak its cheeks and rim its eyesockets. Its eyelights gleam red, wisping with excess determination.

_ Tap, tap.  _

It groans and rolls onto its back, twitching with pain. He enters its cage, strolling around it. Not bad for its first time—it’s grown significantly. A quick measurement tells him that it stands four feet at the shoulder, and seventeen from snout to tail-tip. Not quite an adult size, but not nearly as small as it was. He leaves it to get used to its new body. When he returns later, he finds it staggering around the cage, whining in misery, drool stringing between its teeth. A pool of white vomit sits in the corner, and excess magic drips from the beast’s jaws. He sighs and goes to get a rag.

Several days later, he ups the concentration and amount of DT/M again—and again, and again, until the ten-month-old is the size of a fully-grown blaster. Larger, actually, he discovers when he breaks out his measuring tape. It measures a solid eighteen feet at the shoulder, towering vastly above him, and almost ninety-five feet from snout to tail (most of which is tail). Even the biggest cage he has proves to be far too small for it, which is inconvenient, as the surplus of magic also supplies it with a surplus of energy. It circles in the cage near-constantly, hunched over and wide-eyed, magic frothing at its mouth. It claws at the back wall, which he decides to allow. The concrete is thick enough to withstand the abuse, and the beast needs  _ something  _ to expend energy on. 

Some days, he lets it remain large, adjusting to its newfound size.

Other days—the days they train—he allows it to resume its normal growth and size. It’s much calmer on those days, though it stills skitters nervously around him and always, always watches him, eager to obey. He teaches it basic commands with the clicker, and he teaches it submission with the staff. When it’s twelve months old, he begins teaching it its primary job: eradicating humans.

First, he takes a wad of human cloth (stolen fresh from the dump, so it still retains their scent) and wraps it around a hunk of hamburger. He tosses it to the beast for dinner, and it tears apart the clothing to devour it. He clicks each time it touches claw or fang to the cloth. After that, he wraps fresh cloth around a stick and offers it to the beast. Click whenever it touches fang or claw there. Click when it bites, and then refuse to click for simple touching anymore. Click when it begins to tear, and refuse to click for simple biting anymore. Throughout the process, he adds a cue word:  _ 134, fight.  _

By the time he’s finished, 134 is more than eager to savage anything that smells like a human on his command. Fortunately, it displays no untoward aggression towards monster-scented or washed clothing. It will still attack them, if he commands it to, but it doesn’t begin to growl and bristle until the command comes, whereas with the human clothing it begins aggressive displays at the first scent. He considers it a success.

It takes a little over a year to get the beast trained well enough to take outside—which means the beast has been in this world for approximately twenty-two months when it first sets foot out of the lab. He decides to keep it small, at first, and doesn’t allow it to use the excess magic the concentrator contains as he endeavors to get it accustomed to the outside world. 

“134, attention,” he says, setting a carrier down outside of its cage. Its eyes snap to him, its tail wagging fast and low, ready to be tucked between its legs as soon as he commands it to submit. He tosses a piece of hamburger into the carrier and opens its door, as well as the cage’s door. “Load.”

134 bounds into the carrier, whining with anxious excitement, and snaps up the hamburger. It lays down as he shuts the door, obediently spreading its weight evenly across the carrier’s floor. He drapes a thin cloth over the front to limit its vision, then heads to Hotland. He takes it to a flat, empty spread of desert, far from the roads and puzzles and guards, and he lets it out—er, well. He tries to, anyway. It seems content to huddle in the back of the carrier, so he dumps it out onto the ground. 

It whines anxiously, dancing its paws on the warm, dusty surface—it’s never felt anything like it before. It takes a seat, curling its tail around its feet and lifting its front paws in turn, pawing plaintively at the air. The open space and light also seem to make it anxious, as it continues to squint and lower its head, searching desperately for an enclosed space. But, after almost an hour, it  _ does  _ calm down. There’s only so long a creature can sit frozen in terror—especially when that creature isn’t even two. (Is barely  _ one,  _ really, if one wants to go by ordinary monster ages.)

When the beast finally lays against the sand, resigned, he clicks and treats it.

It seems to look forward to the carrier, after that. The novelty of the experience is a reward on its own, after it gets over its initial fear of the unknown. 

Waterfall is their next visit, and he decides to take a calculated risk. He allows the beast to maintain an adolescent size this time—he doesn’t want it to associate the outside world  _ only  _ with being small—and hides a scrap of human-scented cloth in the forest. 

“134, attention.”

Two fervent eyes dart to him, eyelights like faint red embers within them. The beast, which had been laying next to him, its paws twitching with energy, wags its tail. 

“Find. Fight.”

The beast bursts into action, lunging across the marshy ground in enormous strides. He follows it more sedately, unconcerned with losing it. The tracker embedded into the concentrator prevents that. He hadn’t hidden the clothing far—he’d simply placed it up in a tree, and the beast has no trouble finding it. It lunges up once it does, dragging its claws through the bark and snapping its teeth savagely at the scrap of cloth. Once it gets the cloth between its jaws, it lowers its head and shakes it violently, growling deep in its chest.

A frightening display, for an infant.

He clicks and treats the beast, and it rumbles in delight and paces eagerly around him. They head back to the carrier, but he pauses when he notices smoke drifting over the horizon. 134 sniffs warily at the air. When he peeks through the dense trees at the edge of the forest, he sees Ms. Hatcher’s barn. One of her fields is smoking—a controlled burn, no doubt. At the far edge of the field, he sees a pair of skeletons.

134 takes a step forward, warbling softly.

He immediately turns the concentrator off, forcing the beast back to its normal size, and then loads it into the carrier to make his escape.

He’s leery about letting it visit Snowdin. He’s lost beasts there before, and he’d almost gotten into trouble because of it—the damned Guard had found 113’s dust, even after he’d buried it, and they’d almost gotten Dr. Gaster involved. What a disaster _ that _ would have been. Still, Snowdin is the area where his beasts will, more than likely, be facing a human. They don’t need to be surprised by the snow and cold. 

As it turns out, he needn’t have worried—the beast falls in love with snow as soon as it steps out of its carrier. It wallows in the drifts, its tail wagging furiously, snapping at the flakes as they drift from the sky. He lets it play for a moment before he calls it back to his side. It comes immediately to him, laying down beside his feet and looking up.

“134, attention.”

The beat’s focus sharpens, its bones shifting subtly in anticipation.

“Find. Fight.”

And off it goes. 

At the same time he’s adjusting the beast to the outside world, he begins to try to desensitize it to the alarms—since they will, undoubtedly, be blaring whenever the beast goes to a fight with a real human. He sets a speaker outside of the beast’s kennel just before he heads upstairs each night, and he plays the alarms as loudly as he can. The first time, 134 yelps and squeezes into the far corner of its cage, pawing its skull. He leaves it there. 

Thankfully, the basement is sound-proofed, so he doesn’t have to listen to the alarms  _ or  _ the beast’s wails all night.

When he returns the next morning, the beast lays limply in the corner, its eyesockets closed, resigned to the noise. Good. He clicks and treats it, then takes the alarm away. He repeats the process for a month, and then once every few weeks after that, until the beast doesn’t react at all when the alarms begin. 

As he continues to train the beast, he realizes it’s developed an...odd sort of habit. If it becomes displeased with something (usually a human-scented cloth), it taps a front claw on the concrete.  _ Tap, tap.  _ Then it attacks. If it likes something, it clicks its teeth together. It’s a clever creature, that’s for sure. But it  _ isn’t  _ sapient, and it doesn’t speak. He was very careful about  _ that.  _ Even he couldn’t rationalize treating a sapient creature this way—but the beast is only an animal. Less than that, even, since it lacks a soul. 

In the meantime, he raises a few other beasts in the puppy kennel, separate from 134. Adult beasts—er, large beasts don’t tend to get along well with small beasts, and he won’t risk any of their lives. (Though he doubts any of his small beasts would be much threat to 134, at this point. Most of the little ones are still floating in beakers.) Unfortunately, he hasn’t managed to raise another beast to 134’s age. His experiments have gotten riskier, and the survival rate of his fetuses reflects that. 

So it is that he tends to avoid any risky modifications with 134. The longer it lives, and the more it learns, the more valuable to his work it becomes. He doesn’t want to kill it, not by any means (especially when he doesn’t have a backup yet), so he sticks to simple procedures. He files its spines, claws, and fangs until they’re razor-sharp—he even serrates the back edges of its front claws and fangs to give it more shredding power. It accidentally claws itself more than a few times, but he supposes that was bound to happen. It will grow accustomed to its new modifications in time.

Most everything about 134 seems like a success, thus far. It still has a troubling habit of chewing at the base of its tail and spine, but a sharp rebuke (and a dab of carboxylic acid on the tip of its nose each time he catches it biting) does wonders to make it stop. It’s rather clumsy, when it’s large, but that was to be assumed. An infant can’t very well be expected to accurately pilot an adult’s body. Those skills will develop in time.

“Here,” he says one evening, sliding 134’s food bowl into its cage. It stands, tail wagging eagerly, waiting for his command. “Eat.”

It falls upon the food, eating in savage, gulping bites. He stands and stretches, groaning. What a day. And he still has to prep the DNA gel electrophoresis set-up for tomorrow. Science is such a pain, sometimes. Worth it, but still, such a—

There’s a knock upstairs, relayed to him through an intercom near the basement door. 

He races up, quickly shedding his labcoat and gloves and straightening his t-shirt. He’s not exactly dressed for company, but—ah, well. It isn’t going to hurt anything. He opens the door, beaming, and—

His heart stops. “Dr. Gaster?”

“Did you know?” Dr. Gaster demands. His lower jaw wobbles precariously. He looks distressed, to say the least. 

“Know—know what, sir?”

“About the incubator!” He throws his hands in the air, pacing in an agitated circle. “The lab had a power outage last night, and the back-up generator for the incubators didn’t kick in. Nobody thought to double-check, so it went hours without being repaired, and  _ all of our colonies froze to death.”  _

Oh thank god. “Oh, jeez, that’s awful.”

“Yes, it is! This is the worst possible thing that could have happened.” He wrings his hands, fretting. “What are we going to do? All the time that went into them—agh! Asgore wanted a report last  _ week.” _

“Hey, come on, it’ll be okay. Come inside, I’ll make you a cup of tea. I’ve got peach with ginger? Would you like that?”

Dr. Gaster is, as per usual, easily bribed by tea. He nods miserably, stepping into the house and slumping down at the kitchen table. “I’m sorry I interrupted your weekend, but since you’re my assistant on the project, it felt… _ apt,  _ to inform you as soon as possible.”

“No, no, don’t worry about it.” He slides a steaming mug of tea towards Dr. Gaster. “Hey, you know what the neat thing about science is? No matter how many subjects we lose, we can always make more.”

“Yes,” Dr. Gaster says, staring morosely at his tea. “Yes. I suppose that’s right. But—ah, forgive me. It’s rude to simply jump into these things, isn’t it? Small talk comes first. So, er—what have you been up to, Jackson?”

“Oh, nothing much,” Jackson says, smiling. “Nothing much at all.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: there is nothing fun about this chapter, but, uuuh—gaster's favorite kind of tea is black cherry black tea (although he's also a fan of the classic earl gray.) sans, on the other hand, likes tooth-rottingly sweet black tea, or bleu mint tea. asgore likes golden flower, grillby likes coffee more but if he has to drink tea he likes ginger snap or spiced ginger plum, and alphys prefers chamomile citron or matcha.


	11. around the corner

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: none for this chapter! just some,,,creepy vibes from creepy people

Kindergarten is cool, but it’s a bit…different than Sans expected. Dad talked like it would be a great place for him to learn, but—well, to cut right to the bone, it’s _slow._ Why are they making paper bags with animal heads on them? Why are they coloring letters? Why don’t more people know what two plus two equals? It’s a little demeaning.

On the bright side, there are lots of other kids to talk with. He has fun doing that, for a little while, until Mrs. Collins tells him to “be quiet, please, and let Casey work.” So he sighs and props his face in his hand and colors the letter A with a fat red crayon. He’s curious—do kindergarten crayons taste different than his crayons at home?—so he chews the wax off of his fingers and gets scolded for that, too. Don’t these people know basic scientific theory? He had a question, and he needed research to answer it. 

Blegh.

Storytime is okay—Mrs. Collins doesn’t tell stories as good as Dad, but she’s not bad at it. She does cool voices for the characters, and makes sure they all have time to look at the pictures. After storytime, they have to talk about the main ideas. Sans seizes his chance to answer a question correctly and blurts, “It’s about being generous!”

“That’s a very good option, Sans, but let’s remember to raise our hands before we speak, okay?”

What’s that word Dad says when he gets real frustrated with something? That word he tells Sans not to say because it’s impolite? Oh, yeah.

Shit.

Casey raises his hand. “What’s generous?”

“Sans, dear—can you explain to the class what generous means?” Mrs. Collins asks, looking hopefully at him. He raises his hand. “Oh, no—you don’t need to do that if someone addresses you, first.”

Was she not? Addressing the class collectively? When she asked her previous question? Agh. He can see why Dad says learning social niceties is naught but a necessary hell.

“Generous means you give a lot of something—like time or attention or snacks,” he explains. “So, like, if you give somebody two apples instead of one, you’re being generous.”

“That’s right,” Mrs. Collins says, beaming. “You’re very good at explaining, Sans.”

He gets it from his dad.

“So why do you think being generous is one of the main ideas in this story?” she asks. “Anyone can answer, just raise your hands first, please.”

Storytime is followed by writer’s workshop. They all sit at their desks, and Mrs. Collins tells them to draw a picture of something. He draws a picture of a line since, you know, it’s the easiest thing in the world to draw. After that, he rests his head on his desk and whispers quietly with Casey, who shows him the Pokemon cards he’d found at the dump.

“Sans,” Mrs. Collins say, pausing beside him. “Can you tell me what you drew?”

“A line.”

“Do you know how to spell that?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Can you write it out on the paper for me? It’s alright if it’s not completely correct, yet. We’re just getting started with sounds, after all, you—ah. Well, look at that. That’s perfectly right, Sans. You’re doing great.”

After Mrs. Collins has gone around to help everybody learn the words for their pictures, they move onto learning math. Well. Mrs. Collins _says_ they’re learning math, but all they’re doing is counting. She gives them all Legos, and tells them to count out certain amounts of each color. Sans does so quickly, so he has more time to rest with his head down. He’s starting to get sleepy. Dad usually would’ve let him take a nap by now.

Fortunately, once math time is over, they get to go to lunch. Two of Sans’ favorite things combine in the cafeteria: chatting with people and eating. It’s not as fun as at Grillby’s, though. They all have to sit in rows at big tables, lined up alphabetically, and they’re not allowed to wander around while they eat. 

Dad packed Sans’ lunch—he said cafeteria food was icky, and looking around him, Sans is inclined to think he was right. He chows down on a ham ‘n cheese sandwich, an apple, and trail mix, then succumbs to his post-meal sleepiness and rests his head on the table. Mrs. Collins wakes him up a few minutes later for recess, though, and he has to drag himself out onto the playground. Once there, he gets a burst of energy upon realizing he gets to run and _play_ without being constricted. He takes off with Casey and Casey’s friends, Isabella and Dulce, and they climb all over the jungle gym and race each other down the slides.

“I would _love_ to have a pet dog, but my mom says I can’t have one ‘till I’m older,” Isabella announces as they’re on the swings. 

For some reason, Sans feels inclined to say, “I can be a dog, sometimes.”

“What?” She wrinkles her nose. “Nuh-uh.”

“Uh-huh. I’d show you, but then I’d mess up my clothes. They aren’t my magic ones.”

“Really? ‘cause I think you’re _lying.”_

His honor can’t handle that, so he strips off his clothing right there in front of the swings and changes. Isabella’s eyes grow round and wide, and he laughs, running circles around her. Casey and Dulce shriek in delight and climb all over him, until the teachers race over and frantically try to convince Sans to change back and _put on his clothes, please, please put on his clothes—_

After recess, it’s naptime, and Sans crashes hard (and fully clothed). He curls up on his mat and is asleep within seconds. Naptime is far, far too short, and before long Mrs. Collins is flicking the lights on and coaxing them all back to their seats. For social studies, they all get into small groups and talk about their families. Sans likes that part. 

“My dad’s the Royal Scientist, Dr. Gaster,” he says, just a liiittle bit smug.

“Oooh,” Dulce says, “that’s how come you already know all this stuff.”

“Exactly. So don’t feel bad if you can’t keep up.” He winks.

“Well, who’s your mama?” Casey asks, playing with the tuft at the end of his tail. 

“Don’t have one, and don’t need one,” Sans says.

“What about brothers? Or sisters?”

“Nope. ‘s just me and my dad. Oh, and sometimes my Uncle Asgore.”

“Wait, _the_ Asgore? King Asgore?” Isabella demands. “No way.”

“Yes way,” Sans says. Unfortunately, he can’t prove that one so easily, so they delve into an argument until Mrs. Collins comes and redirects their conversation.

Then it’s silent reading time. Sans grabs a book and curls up on a beanbag in the quiet corner, flipping happily through the pages. He doesn’t have time to finish, but when he asks, Mrs. Collins says he can take it home with him. Art is next—they’re all armed with tiny paintbrushes and palettes, and they’re instructed to paint a picture of their favorite activity. Sans paints a picture of himself sleeping—and then, on second thought, a picture of himself reading with his dad (Remy is also there, as a messy gray blob, because he loves playing with Remy). 

The last part of the day is playtime. They’re released to go play with the toys in the classroom until their parents come to get them. Sans ends up playing with the dollhouse in the corner, along with his little crew of friends—Isabella, Dulce, and Casey. Their dolls are scientist superheros who are breaking monsters out of the Underground. Sans’ doll has just challenged the Human King to a pie-eating contest when his dad arrives.

“Sans?” Mrs. Collins touches his shoulder. “Your father is here.”

He whirls around. Dad stands awkwardly in the classroom doorway, clutching his carrier bag to his chest and looking extremely intimidated by the hoard of five-year-olds who all glance in his direction. 

_“That’s_ the Royal Scientist?” Isabella asks. “He looks kinda...wimpy.”

“He’s kind of a pushover,” Sans allows, “but he’s the best. Anyway, Iiiii gotta go—see you guys tomorrow!”

Sans rides a chorus of goodbyes over to his father, reaching out to snag his hand. 

“Hello, Sans,” Dad says, squeezing his hand gently as they exit the classroom. “How was your first day of school?”

“Mm, it was okay,” Sans decides. 

“Just okay?”

“Kinda boring.” He hops over the lines in the tiles. “Some things were fun, I guess. I liked the other monsters.”

“I’m glad. You’ve learned a lot of things already, so I’m not surprised you found some of the education in the classroom to be unchallenging. The good news is that they have an advanced program once you reach the first grade. We’ll see if you can’t get into that.”

“Advanced program?”

“Mm-hm. For students who learn more quickly, like yourself.”

“Were you in an advanced program?”

“Me?” Dad chuckles. “No. Far from it.”

“Why not? Weren’t you just as smart when you were a kid?”

“Well, perhaps not _quite_ as smart as you are,” he says, setting a hand on Sans’ head, “but I was fairly intelligent, yes. They simply measured intelligence by different standards, back then. They didn’t have advanced programs, either. That was a long time ago.”

“Well, I don’t wanna be in the program either, then.”

“Sans…”

“No, really. If you didn’t do it, why should I? If I can grow up to be just as smart as you without doin’ that stuff, then I don’t wanna _do_ that stuff.”

“It’s not about making you smarter. The program, it’s—it’s about making your school experience more enjoyable, more tailored to your needs. Would you rather be tracing letters or learning about chemistry?”

“Chemistry,” Sans says, his eyes going wide. 

“Precisely.”

They walk quietly for a moment, their boots crunching once they reach the snowy street. Sans swings their hands between them. “Dad?”

“Yes?”

“Can I go learn chemistry with you one day? At the lab?”

Dad pauses for a long moment. “You’d like that? Going to the lab?”

“Yeah! It sounds super cool.”

“Hm. Well, perhaps someday soon I’ll have to take you, then.”

Sans cheers, pumping a fist in the air. A real science lab—he’s so _excited!_

* * *

“This is it?” Sans asks, peering up at the squat, dusky gray building before them. “I thought it’d be bigger.”

“It goes underground, too,” Dad says.

“Oooh.”

They stride through the doors, which part for them with an automatic _whoosh._ The lobby is a wide, warmly-lit room with several couches and a desk at the far corner. The bat at the desk glances up, pushing his spectacles back up his snout. “Good morning, Dr. Gaster. Who’s this?”

“This is my son, Sans. He’ll be with me today,” Dad says, resting a hand on Sans’ head. “Sans, this is one of our receptionists, Charlie.”

“Hi,” Sans says, grinning at him and standing on his tip-toes to see over the desk. “Do you wanna hear a joke?”

Charlie closes his book. “Always, young man.”

“What’s the first thing kids learn at school?”

“Hmm—I don’t know. What is it?”

“The alpha- _bat!”_

Charlie laughs, his ears swiveling happily, and Dad hides a grin behind his hand. Sans giggles in delight, tugging his Dad along towards the next set of doors, which Charlie unlocks for them. The doors open onto a long, glossy white hallway with bright fluorescent lights. Something about it is...familiar. It smells like disinfectant. Sans clicks his teeth together.

“Alright?” Dad asks. He looks unusually nervous.

“Uh-huh.” Sans nods quickly. “Where do you work?”

“Well, this over here is my office.” Dad leads him to a little brown door with a golden nameplate on it: DR. W.D. GASTER, ROYAL SCIENTIST. Dad presses his ID card to a scanner on the wall and the door unlocks—he fiddles with the scanner’s settings for a moment, and the lock disables. Sans steps forward, into a windowless room with an enormous desk. The desk houses a computer, two monitors, a cup of pencils and pens, a keyboard, a bottle of hand sanitizer, a mouse (of the non-living variety), and a stack of thin manilla folders. Behind it sits a swivel chair, which Sans immediately climbs into. His dad takes a seat in one of the plush armchairs across from the desk—the one speckled with white fur. 

“Hey, that’s me,” Sans says, pointing at a series of pictures Dad has hanging on his wall—family photos they’d taken over the years. In one, Sans is in his regular form, beaming and sitting on Dad’s shoulders. In another, he’s in his blaster form, grinning a doggy grin at the camera while Dad crouches next to him, a hand on his shoulder. His tail is wagging too fast for the camera; it’s naught but a white blur. 

“That’s you too,” Dad says, gesturing to another pair of pictures. One is of a very tiny skeleton, wrapped snugly in a yellow blanket and chewing the tip of his thumb. Another is of an equally tiny blaster crouched in a playbow. His tail is a blur again. 

“I don’t remember those,” Sans says, standing up on the chair to look closer. He sees several manifested hands swarm to hover cautiously around him, ready to catch him if he falls. He has no doubt some of them are holding the chair steady.

“You were very little when they were taken. Only twenty-two months, I think—and that was from a zygote, so compared to other monsters, you were twelve months old.”

“Huh. What’s a zygote?”

One of the manifested hands moves to settle on the computer mouse, filtering through several encrypted folders in the computer. Eventually, a photo pops onto the screen. This one is of something he recognizes as a cell. “This is a zygote,” Dad explains. “The first cell of a living creature. This was you, about six years ago.”

“No way.” Sans studies the photo fervently. “I was that little?”

“Yes. You were a tiny thing; nothing but DNA and magic. You got bigger quickly, though.” Dad flips through several more pictures. “This was your development over the following months—in that first, you were a month old. In the second, a second month old. So on and so forth. The details are in the caption.

Sans glances at the caption beneath one of the photos and reads the words GBP01, 2MO, Leica 100X, December 23rd. 

“What does all that mean?” 

Dad leans against the desk, reading over the words with him. “GBP01 was what I called you, at first. I didn’t know your font yet, so I couldn’t name you. 2MO—two months old. Leica was the microscope I used to take the photo, at 100 times magnification, and December 23rd was the date it was taken.”

“Oh.” He clicks to the next photo, revealing similar data. “This one says ‘refer to Genome 1A.’ What’s that mean?”

“That was the DNA sequence I used to make you. It’s primarily mine, but I made a few changes to allow you to shapeshift. I’d show you some cool sequences, but—” He grimaces. “I’m afraid I lost all the official papers regarding the project quite some time ago. All I have now is what I stored online. Although we do have the record of our base genome, if you’d like me to pull it up. It lacks the coolest modifications, but it’s really quite—”

There’s a sudden knock on the door, and Dad goes to open it. “Good morning, Dr. Gaster.” A small owl in a lab coat stands outside the door, a clipboard clutched to his chest. “I just wanted to let you know that all of the colonies have been recreated and plated on agar—oh, well hello, there. You must be Sans.”

Sans _wants_ to smile, but something about the owl makes him feel...weird.

“Yes, that’s him,” Dad says. “Sans, say hello. This is one of my lab assistants, Jackson. You knew him when you were very small.”

Sans waves tentatively. “Hi, Mr. Jackson.”

“Hi, buddy. You’ve gotten a lot bigger, haven’t you?” Jackson grins, then glances back at Dad. “Anyhow, doc, the agar plates are back in the incubator and the colonies should resume growth soon.”

“Very good, thank you. I’ll let Asgore know the report will have to wait a few more weeks.”

Jackson leaves, after that, and Sans chews the tip of his thumb. “Is he mean?” he asks.

“Mean? Jackson? No. He’s quite polite, actually.”

“Huh.”

“Why? Did you not like him?”

“No, he was okay. I just—got a weird feeling when I saw him.” He shrugs. “It’s probably nothin’. Hey, when do we get to go do some cool stuff?”

“Well, let’s see—you wanted to learn chemistry, right? I can take you up to the chem lab, and we can do a few titrations.”

“What’s a titration?”

“I’ll show you. C’mon.” Dad offers his hand, and Sans races over to grab it. Together, the two of them head deeper into the lab. The chem lab itself is on the top floor, and several scientists bustle about inside, moving from lab bench to lab bench with their hands full of test tubes and beakers and little brown bottles of liquids and powders. “Here—arms out.”

Sans sticks his arms out, and Dad slips a tiny lab coat onto him. It’s not quite tiny enough, but it only drags a little bit behind him. Dad rolls up the waist to shorten it, then stands back and nods, satisfied. “Do I look like a scientist?” Sans asks, glancing hopefully at himself.

“Almost—just a few more things.” Dad hands him a pair of goggles, tightening the strap so they won’t slide down the back of his skull. For good measure, he also sticks on a couple pieces of tape, and does the same for himself. Next are blue nitrile gloves, which cling weirdly to his knuckles. He must make a face, because Dad laughs and says, “You get used to it, don’t worry.”

“Hey, who’s this little guy?” one of the chemists asks, bending down to peer curiously at him. “He must be our new lab assistant, huh, Dr. Gaster?”

“I’m Sans,” Sans says, beaming. “I’m gonna be a scientist when I grow up.”

“Is that right? Well, it’s a fun job, most of the time,” the chemist says, grinning. “Lots of clean-up, though, I gotta say.”

Sans grimaces, and the chemist laughs.

“So what experiment are you two boys doing today?” they ask.

“Just a simple titration,” Dad says, leading Sans towards a lab bench. He drags over a stool and scoops Sans up, plopping him down on it so he can see. “Then we’re gonna head down to the bio lab and see what they’re up to, I think.”

“Acid-base titration? I’ll get your reagents,” the chemist offers.

“Thank you very much,” Dad says. He gestures towards the room in the back, which the chemist disappears into. “That’s the chemical storage closet. It’s where we keep all our chemicals—our reagents.”

“Ooooh. Can we go see?”

“Ah—-maybe we can see that one when you’re older.”

Sans helps Dad set up a long tube he calls a buret. Beneath it they place a small, empty beaker. Two graduated cylinders are also brought out and set on the counter, as well as a funnel and a tiny pipette. The chemist returns with three brown bottles, setting them out on the counter. “Here you boys are. Have fun.”

“I’m sure we will,” Dad says, reaching for one of the bottles. “Alright, Sans. This is carboxylic acid, so be very careful not to spill it. It’s diluted, but it still hurts if you get it onto yourself. We’re going to pretend we don’t know the concentration, and we’re going to pour a little bit into this cylinder to measure it.” Dad pours a clear, smooth liquid into one of the cylinders. “There. Can you tell me how much that is? Make sure to get on eye level with it, and read from the bottom of the meniscus—the little dip in the surface.”

Sans crouches on his stool to get eye-level with the cylinder, squinting. “Uuum—looks like about five?”

“Five what?”

“Uuuh—”

“Milliliters,” Dad tells him. “You can tell by looking at the letters right here: mL. Now, we’re going to pour this into our beaker and add a few drops of our indicator, which is phenolphthalein. You wanna drop some in there for me?”

Dad shows him how to use the pipette, and Sans carefully drops two droplets of another clear liquid into the acid. “This is just like playing with water.”

“Seems like it, doesn’t it? Alright, now we’re going to put our base—sodium hydroxide—into our buret. The acid and the base have a 1:1 molar ratio, so when the amount of base is equal to the amount of acid, the liquid will change colors because of the indicator. It’s called the equivalence point. That way, we can discover the concentration of the acid using the concentration of the base, which we already know. Does that make sense?”

Sans scratches his head.

“I’ll write it out for you in a moment,” Dad decides, carefully pouring the base (also clear) into the buret. “It’s easier to explain once you have all the data.” He slides the beaker of acid and indicator underneath the buret, so he can drizzle in tiny amounts of the base. “Now we’re going to add little amounts of the base and swirl it around with the acid. Once we reach the right amount of base, it’ll change colors. That’s the cool part. Can you swirl the beaker around for me?”

Sans carefully swirls the beaker as Dad steadily adds in more of the base. For several minutes, nothing happens, and Sans is beginning to doubt how cool chemistry is. Then, all of a sudden, the clear solution flashes pink. Sans’ eyes go round. “Dad look! Dad _look!”_

Dad laughs. “Yes, that’s it: the equivalence point.”

“I wanna take a picture,” Sans says immediately, studying the bright pink solution with adoration. “Can I take a picture? And you can put it on your wall?”

“Sans’ first experiment—yes, that would make a good picture.” He pats his pockets. “Damn. I must have left my phone in my office. I’ll just go get—” He pauses, then evidently thinks better of leaving a five-year-old alone in a chemistry lab. “Do you remember where my office is, Sans?”

“Mm-hm.” Sans nods quickly. “Down the hall, into the elevator, down to the first floor, and it’s the first door on the right.”

“Very good. Here.” Dad hands him his ID card. “My phone should be on my desk. I’ll clean up here while you go get it.”

“Leave the pink stuff. I wanna picture.”

“I know, I know. I won’t take it away.”

Sans sheds his lab coat, tying it around his neck before he shifts into his blaster form—it’s faster, and it can smell better, so if he gets confused about where he’s going, he can just follow his own scent back to the office. Fortunately, he wore some of his favorite clothes today—the magic stretchy ones that shift with him, instead of the ones he usually tears up with his shifts. “I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere.”

“I’ll stay put, don’t worry. And if you get lost, just ask an adult to point you towards the chem lab, okay? They’ll know where to go.”

“Got it,” Sans says, trotting towards the door. He breaks into a run once he reaches the hallway, his labcoat flapping behind him like a cape. He shakes his ill-fitting gloves off of his paws, scooping them up in his mouth and tossing them into the trash can next to the elevator. He rears up onto his hind legs, poking the button to call the elevator to him. It takes him down to the first floor, and he finds his dad’s office easily. The room reeks of his scent—stale bone, tea, and disinfectant. 

Dad’s phone sits right where he said it would, on the edge of his desk. Sans carefully picks it up in his jaws, tucking it into a lab coat pocket before taking off again. He darts out of the room, skidding around the corner (slick tile was not made with little skeleton paws in mind) and— _wham!_ He slams into someone’s legs, and they trip over him, slamming a foot down against his tail. He yelps and spins around, crouching wide-eyed as folders and papers scatter around him. 

“Shit, what the—?!” Jackson scrambles back to his feet, clutching his chest. For a second, he looks on Sans with terror—and then his face smooths out, and he breathes a sigh of relief. “Oh. It’s just you. Sorry, Sans. Wow, you—really have gotten a lot bigger, haven’t you?”

“Uh—yeah.” He wags his tail sheepishly. (It’s sore.) “Sorry. Didn’t mean to trip you.”

“Eh, don’t worry about it. It happens.” Jackson reaches for his folders, begin to gather them quickly. “Where’s your dad?”

“Chem lab,” Sans says, springing into action and trying to collect Jackson’s papers for him since, you know, it’s his fault they’re all over the floor. His paws aren’t particularly useful for such a task, but he doesn’t really want to be in his more vulnerable form, not around...him. His eye suddenly catches on a picture as he gathers the papers. It’s a sketch of bat wings—but beneath that, there’s a much more interesting picture. It’s a picture of a monster, and it looks like him. Like a blaster, but even bigger. For some reason, it’s terribly familiar. He pauses, pushing the other papers away. The scrawl beneath the picture says GBP134, 14MO, Genome 3A, October 15. Huh. That’s—

That’s really weird.

“Oh, no, here.” Jackson snatches up the paper before he can look any closer. “I’ll get them. You’re just crumpling them all, I’m afraid.”

“No, it’s, um. It’s okay.” He backs up slowly. “I should get back upstairs. Sorry. Again.”

Jackson watches him carefully, and Sans’ soul prickles under his gaze. The air tastes bitter between his teeth. “It’s alright. Just be more careful, okay? You never know what can be around the corner. Labs are dangerous places.”

“Yeah,” Sans says. “I guess they are.”

He takes off, bolting towards the elevator. When he gets to the chem lab, he’s panting, but he’s away from that weird owl, and those...weird papers…

“Sans, there you are,” Dad says, striding towards him. “I was getting worried.”

“Sorry. I accidentally tripped Jackson, heh,” he says, pulling out Dad’s phone and handing it to him. 

“Tsk. You shouldn’t run in a lab, little one.”

“How’d you know I was running?”

Gaster arches his bonebrow.

“Yeah, okay. I was running.”

“Don’t do it anymore, please. Here.” Dad scoops him up—a feat that’s a fair bit more difficult, when he’s in this form—and sets him down on the lab bench, next to the titration. “Lay down next to it and smile. I’ll get a picture.”

Sans obediently lays down next to his first experiment, offering the phone a doggy grin and trying hard not to wag his tail, lest he shatter something important. When the phone clicks, he bursts into movement again, hopping from the bench to the stool and then to the ground. He helps Dad clean up the last of the experiment, then pads next to him as they head for the biology lab.

“So,” he says, glancing up, “you said there were no more blasters, right?” 

“None except for you and the ones I make with my magic.”

“Oh, okay.” So maybe the blaster in the picture was one of his dad’s magic ones? “So is that what GBP134 is? A magic blaster?”

“What?” Dad’s pace falters for a moment, and he stops, looking down at Sans.

“GBP134. The other blaster. The big one.”

“Where did you see something like that?”

“Downstairs, when I tripped Jackson, he had all these papers and they fell down—one of ‘em had a picture of this big blaster. Underneath it said GBP134. It also said fourteen months old, but I don’t think that’s true, because it was way too big to be a baby. So it must be magic, right?”

Dad stares at him.

“Dad?” His tail wags—slow, slower, stopping. “Is something wrong?”

“Did you see anything else? Anything at all?”

“The—the picture, it also said Genome 3A, October 15, like how you labelled my pictures. Why? How come?”

Dad glances up and down the empty hallway, then crouches in front of him. “You’re _sure_ you saw that, Sans? You aren’t lying?”

“What? No!” He scowls. “I’m not a liar.”

“I know.” Dad’s own frown deepens. “That’s what concerns me.”

“What’s the matter? Did you not know there was another one? But if it’s your magic, then how did you not know?”

“Shh, Sans.” Dad sets a hand on his head. “I’ll figure it out, okay? I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about. Just a misunderstanding of some sort.”

“Are you sure?”

Dad is quiet. “...no. But I’ll speak with Jackson first thing tomorrow.”

“Why not now?”

“Because right now,” Dad says, scooping him up and draping him around his shoulders like a bony scarf. That gets a giggle out of him, despite the sudden heaviness in his soul. “I’m going to take my son down to see the biology lab.”

* * *

Sans is in the middle of watching Dad plate _E. coli_ when the door to the biology lab bursts open. Dad jumps and whirls around, his eyes wide. “Where,” Asgore bellows happily, “is my favorite _scientist?”_

“Right here,” Sans says, hopping off of his stool and puffing his chest out.

“There he is!” Asgore agrees, picking him up and squeezing him tightly. Sans giggles, wrapping his arms around Asgore’s neck and hugging back. 

“I feel so appreciated,” Dad says dryly.

“Don’t be silly, Wingdings,” Asgore says, reaching down and dragging Dad up and into the hug. Sans slings an arm out to wrap it around his dad’s shoulders. “You’re my favorite _Royal_ Scientist.”

“I’m your only Royal Scientist,” Dad grumbles against the fur of Asgore’s neck. 

“That you are,” Asgore says, chuckling and setting them both back down on their feet. “How’s your lab tour been, Sans? Did your daddy teach you a lot?”

Sans nods quickly. “Uh-huh. It’s _super_ cool. Dad, show him the picture of the titration.”

Dad shows him the picture of the titration.

“Now, that _is_ cool,” Asgore says. “I’m not gonna pretend I understand it, but I’m glad you two do. You know what else is cool, though?”

“What?” Sans asks.

“Lunchtime,” Asgore says, clapping his hands together. “Come on, you both need brain food. I’m taking you to lunch.”

“We don’t have brains,” Sans points out. 

“Or digestive systems,” Asgore agrees, spreading his hands, “and yet, you still need food. C’mon, let’s finish up this sciency stuff and then hit the road. They’ve got this cute new diner near the palace I was thinking we could try out.”

So off to lunch they go. Dad eats fries, Sans eats soup, and Asgore eats savory pie. As they’re leaving the restaurant, Dad pulls Asgore aside, instructing Sans to get a bubblegum ball from the machine in the lobby. Sans is more than tempted to listen into their conversation, but they’re signing, and they’re turned away from him. He frowns and jams a blue gumball into his mouth, chewing vigorously. 

Sans and Dad go back to the lab for a little while, after that, and Dad shows him the physics lab (which, Sans thinks, is the _coolest_ lab). He also gets to attend a meeting with Dad, and he tries his best to sit still and behave. Dad seems proud of him, and he gets to eat a blueberry donut, too. When the meeting’s over, Dad begins to pack up his carrier bag for the trip home. Sans gets bored waiting on him and wanders into the hallway, drawn towards the door right next to his dad’s office.

“Alright, Sans,” Dad says, closing his office behind him. “Are you ready to go?”

“What’s in here?” Sans asks.

“Ah.” Dad stops beside him, gazing at the door. “It’s a storage room, for books and equipment, mostly.”

“Can I see?”

Dad hesitates, then unlocks the door and pushes it open. Sans steps inside, and, indeed, it’s a storage room—books and strange, heavy machinery line the walls. In the back, there’s a little, empty pool built into the floor. The air is warm and dark. 

“When you were very little,” Dad says, “this is where I raised you.”

“Oh.” Sans paces the room, running his fingers along the spines of textbooks and bound theses. “Like a nursery?”

“...yes. A little bit like a nursery.”

“How come I didn’t go home with you?”

“I—wasn’t home very much, back then. I spent most of my time in the lab.”

“With me?”

“With you.”

A smile flickers across Sans’ face. “Okay. Cool.” He turns around, snagging Dad’s hand as he leaves the room. “I’m glad we get to go home now, though.”

“Yes,” Dad says, closing the door with one final _click._ “I am, too.”

Asgore is there, when they get home. Sans gets squished into another hug. “There my boys are,” Asgore says cheerfully. “How was the rest of your day?”

“It was good,” Sans says, rocking on his heels once he’s set down. “How come you’re here?”

“Because your dad invited me here,” Asgore says, “and because I’m going to be babysitting _you_ tonight, little mister.”

“Babysitting? Why? Where are you going?” Sans asks, glancing at Dad. 

“I’m going to go talk to Jackson for a little while,” Dad explains, setting down his carrier bag. “I don’t think I’ll be long, but just in case, I wanted Asgore here.”

“You’re going right now? But it’s already dark.”

“It’ll be okay, Sans. Trust me.” Dad crouches in front of him, bonking their foreheads together. “I’ll be back before you know it, but this is something I need to do.”

“All alone?” Sans says, frowning. 

“Oh, little one. Haven’t you learned by now?” Dad smiles slyly at him, pointing his chin at the window. Sans sees the purple glow of several pairs of eyes outside, looming high above the ground, and he hears the crunch of bony claws through ice. “We’re never alone.”

Sans is only slightly comforted by this. 

Dad stays just long enough to put him to bed. From his bedroom, Sans hears the low mumble of voices downstairs as Dad speaks with Asgore, but he can’t quite make out the words. He kicks his blankets off and sneaks over to his door, pressing the side of his skull to the crack at the bottom. 

“...think he would do that,” Dad murmurs. “Like I told Sans, it’s probably a misunderstanding. He’s...weirdly invested in that project. I’m just going to clear things up with him.”

“So late at night?” Asgore asks, disapproval clear in his voice. “Be honest, Wingdings. You’re expecting the worst.”

“Hope for the best, prepare for the worst, expect the mediocre,” Dad says. Sans can almost hear him shrug. 

“At least take the Dogi with you. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.”

“Don’t you think Jackson might find that a bit aggressive?”

“And going to his house in the middle of the night isn’t?”

“He’s a scientist _and_ an owl, he’s not asleep. Trust me. He’ll be fine with it. Nothing bad is happening, Asgore. I’m sure of it.”

“Then why even check?”

“Because I need to be really, _really_ sure of it. If he’s—if he’s created more—” Dad cuts off swiftly. “But of course he hasn’t. He couldn’t. There was only enough of my DNA to make Sans. Unless—oh, but that’s not possible. Never mind. There’s simply no way he could have created more.”

“Well, for everyone’s sake, I hope you’re right. Don’t do anything foolish. Call the Royal Guard if you need them.”

“I will. I’m not going to fight—I’m just going to talk.”

“You’d better. Take care, Wingdings. I’ll see you soon.”

“See you soon, Your Majesty.”

The front door opens and clicks shut, and Sans creeps back to his bed. He sits down for a moment, chewing the tip of his thumb anxiously. Another blaster? Dad thinks Jackson could have really created another blaster? He wouldn’t be going if he didn’t think it was a possibility, no matter what he says. And it’s Sans’ fault he’s going, isn’t he? If he had just kept his mouth shut…

But no. If there _is_ another blaster, Dad needs to know about it, right? Why did Asgore mention the Royal Guard, though? Surely the blaster wouldn’t hurt Dad. It has his DNA, so it’s like his son, too. It has his DNA, so it’s like—so it’s like—

So it’s like Sans’ family.

Sans’ eyes widen. His family. If that blaster really does exist, then it’s his family, and Dad is going to rescue it. There’s no _way_ Sans can sit back and let him do that all alone. He glances towards the window, and that seals the deal. It’s _so easy_ to escape the house. The window used to be baby-proofed, but it hasn’t been, for a couple of years now. It’s just a simple latch, and Sans quickly undoes it. The drop from the second story is significant, but for a blaster, it won’t be a problem. 

He digs through his closet, shifting into his blaster form before tugging on his sweatpants and his blue winter coat. He tugs his tail through the slit at the back of his pants, lashing it once, and then hooks his claws beneath the window and pushes it up. The curtains billow out away from him, and cold air chills his bones. The screen bars his way, and with a flash of regret, he tears his claws through it. He takes deep, bolstering breath, and then he springs.

The snow softens his landing. He bends his legs and surges forward as he hits the ground, trying to transmit most of the energy out and away from his joints. He pauses for a moment, using his magic to shut the window behind him (he wouldn’t want Remy to get cold). Then he lifts his snout, listening. Silence reigns. Not a peep from inside or outside of the house—only faintly, in the distance, the howl of Greater Dog. He’s tempted to howl back, but he keeps his mouth shut, for once. He doesn’t particularly want to be caught. Dad wouldn’t be very happy with him.

Sans sniffs around the outside of the house until he finds Dad’s scent, heading up the street. He keeps his nose to the ground, tail wagging, and follows his dad into the dark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: gaster's teachers and family largely thought he was stupid. (maybe not such a fun fact??) he couldn't pay attention for long periods of time, and he had trouble organizing his thoughts and conforming to social standards. he's gotten a lot better at it (i.e. forced himself to get better so others approved of him) since then, and he's not usually insecure about his intelligence anymore. he knows he's smart, even if he doesn't do well on standardized tests and he always got poor grades--he's smart and he's the royal fucking scientist, because intelligence isn't about grades and tests, damn it.


	12. friends?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: unethical and non-consensual surgical procedures, child abuse, child neglect, very unethical experimentation, and a smidgen of body horror**

The Riverperson regards him solemnly as he boards their boat. “Tra la la,” they murmur. “Sometimes the best things are the most unexpected.”

“Yes, well,” Gaster says. “I certainly didn’t expect this.”

He certainly didn’t expect it, and he certainly doubts it’s going to be  _ the best,  _ no matter what it is. The Riverperson drops him off in Hotland, and he stamps the slushy snow off of his boots and heads into town. Jackson’s house sits right on the outskirts, and he’s there within minutes. He raps his knuckles on the door, clasping his hands neatly at the small of his back as he waits.

“Dr. Gaster?” Jackson asks, blinking owlishly at him when he opens the door. “It’s late, isn’t it?”

“I assumed you would be awake, given your nocturnal nature.”

“Well, you’re right.” Jackson smiles, just a tad sleepily. “I do have an early shift tomorrow, though, so I expect I’ll be going to bed soon. Was there something you needed?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact. May I come in? I think we need to have a discussion.”

Jackson steps aside, and Gaster steps in. “What is this about?”

“My son said he saw a paper of yours today—one detailing a blaster called GBP134.” Gaster lifts his gaze to meet Jackson’s. “Reassure me that that was a misunderstanding, Jackson.”

“I assure you it was a misunderstanding,” Jackson says immediately, taking a seat at the table. Gaster sits across from him. “I’m not quite sure which paper he saw, but if it’s the one I’m thinking of, it was simply an illustration of a blaster—not a photo. I drew it myself. You said I could tinker with the project, didn’t you?”

Gaster inclines his head. “So I did.”

“The illustration was just an example of an ideal blaster—working out size specifications, shapes, things like that,” Jackson explains. “It was hardly real, and it  _ won’t  _ be, not for years and years.”

“Not until you’ve figured how to make them non-sapient.”

“Exactly. See, you’re getting it, Dr. Gaster. Can I interest you in some tea?”

“No, thank you.”

Jackson’s eyebrows raise.

“May I see the papers that Sans saw? Your tinkering?”

“Hm? Sure. I’ll go get them.” Jackson slips out of the room and returns a few moments later, a slim folder in his hands. He sets it down in front of Gaster. “There you go. Try not to be too harsh on it, alright? They’re just starter ideas.”

Gaster flips through the pages and he does, indeed, find an illustration of an adult blaster. Perhaps that really was all Sans saw. The thought comforts him. “This is all?”

“Well, it’s a work in progress. I don’t have much spare time to spend on it,” Jackson admits. He bustles around the kitchen, fixing himself a mug of tea. 

“Where’s the label?”

“The label?”

“Yes. Sans said there was a label beneath the picture he saw. GBP134, 14MO, Genome 3A, October 15.”

Jackson shakes his head. “I’m sorry. I don’t have anything like that. You can see all of it for yourself.” He nods at the folder. “I’m not calling your kid a liar, Dr. Gaster, but—children  _ do  _ have very active imaginations, and you  _ had  _ just got done telling him about the blaster project, hadn’t you? You were showing him photos when I walked in. Maybe he was remembering something from them. October 15th  _ is  _ his birthday. Kind of a convenient date to say, isn’t it?”

“Sans knows what he’s talking about. He doesn’t make things up.”

“I’m not saying he does. But remembering all of that information so exactly? Even for a smart kid, doc, that’s—well, it’s a little bit unrealistic, unless he’s got an eidetic memory. Does he?”

Gaster shakes his head. 

“Besides, a fourteen-month-old would hardly be the size of an adult blaster. And Genome 3A? That doesn’t exist. Even I haven’t coded anything that far.” He laughs. “I’m still on Genome 1B. Genetics isn’t exactly my forte.”

“Ah, mine either.”

“But I  _ do  _ have a fascinating theory, based on what you did with Genome 1A.” He pulls a paper out of his file, tapping it. “You triggered Sans’ shapeshifting ability by changing the active phenotype, right?”

“Right.”

“You have all of the same genes, Dr. Gaster. If you changed  _ your  _ active phenotype—”

Gaster laughs. “Oh, come now. Changing the active phenotype of every cell in my body? I mean, I know I’m only a skeleton, but that’s still millions of cells. It would be impossible to modify every single one.”

“Exactly,” Jackson says, his eyes shining. “That’s why you’d have to alter the phenotype of the stem cell line.”

“The stem cells.” Gaster steeples his fingers. “That’s still a lot of cells.”

“Yes, but not nearly as many.”

“Bone doesn’t reproduce itself nearly as quickly as other organs. It would take years for the stem cells to replace all of the other cells. You’d need to increase the cell replacement rate somehow.”

“Growth hormone with osteoblasts?”

“Not alone. That would only trigger the cells to put more bone down without getting rid of any of the old cells. It’d be rather...blocky.”

“Parathyroid hormone and osteoclasts to break down the bone?”

“How would it differentiate between the new cells and the old, unmodified cells?” Gaster asks.

“Stem cells build from the inside, don’t they? We could put PTH and osteoclasts in solution, so it only dissolved the bone on the outside. The new cells would be safe.”

“When the new cells reached the outside? How would you know?” 

“Well, I suppose the skeleton would turn into a blaster.”

“No, no, it would change along the way, as you were replacing cells. Once you had enough blaster cells, they would simply force the other bone to break to make way for their proper positioning. It would be a traumatic experience. Good thing you’re not doing it.”

“No, of course not,” Jackson says, waving a hand. “Just a theory.”

“It’s a fascinating one,” Gaster offers. 

“Thank you.” Jackson wraps his fingers around his mug of tea, sipping at it. “Anyhow, Dr. Gaster, I hate to run you off, but I do need to get to bed soon. I hope I’ve eased your mind.”

“You have,” Gaster says, standing and pushing his chair in. “Thank you for your time. I didn’t think you would create another blaster—I mean, where would you even get the DNA for it, right?—but I had to be sure, you understand. I would be  _ very  _ upset if my project and my trust were abused in such a way.”

“Well, trust me, doc, I haven’t abused anything. Wouldn’t even dream of it.”

“I’m glad to hear that. Have a good night, Jackson. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“See you, Dr. Gaster.”

And with that, Gaster steps out of the house and back into the dark.

* * *

Sans sloshes out of the river, shaking himself off on Hotland’s bank and basking in the warmth that emanates up from the ground. The Riverperson’s hood angles in his direction, and he cocks his head. “What?” he asks. “No cryptic remark for me? Is it ‘cause I didn’t ride in your boat?”

“Tra la la—some wetland sedges can be made into paper, if you work with them enough,” the Riverperson offers. 

“Huh.” Sans wags his tail. “I think I’ve heard about that before. It’s really cool. Okay, see ya, bud.”

He takes off, loping across the hard-baked earth with his nose to the ground. Dad’s scent leads him to the outskirts of town, to a sturdy little house with a wraparound porch. He recognizes another scent here, too—Jackson. When he listens, he can hear the low murmur of voices inside. They sound calm and quiet, which is comforting. Maybe they’ve settled things? Maybe it really  _ was  _ a misunderstanding? He hopes so, but—

But a small, selfish part of him is disappointed. 

Sans stalks around the house, sniff-sniff-sniffing for hints of anything nefarious, but there’s nothing—only the cold, clinical smell of science, which he assumes is from all Jackson’s time hanging around the lab. He’s half-tempted to return home (he doubts anyone realizes he’s gone yet, and he needs to repair the window screen so they never find out he left), but at the same time, he doesn’t want to leave his dad alone quite yet. Instead, he wedges himself beneath the porch to wait. You know, just—just in case.

(Because, despite a distinct lack of evidence, something about Jackson just feels  _ bad.) _

He lays his head down on the warm dirt, closes his eyes, and listens—but the thing about being a five-year-old (and a very sleepy one, at that) is that closing one’s eyes whilst lying down in a warm, cozy spot in the middle of the night usually results in one thing: sleep. It catches Sans quickly. He dozes lightly beneath the porch, paws twitching, and only startles awake when he hears the creak of the porch above him. 

Footsteps head away from him, dropping quietly on the dusty ground. He lifts his head slowly, keeping his body still, lest someone spot him. He sees Dad walking away from the house, his overcoat draped over one arm. His gait is easy and relaxed—he’s not injured or scared. Good. Sans breathes a sigh of relief, then settles in to wait a few moments longer. Once Dad starts down the river, he’ll follow. Hopefully Dad won’t look into his room before he gets home. (One can dream, right?) 

Once Dad is out of sight, he starts to squirm out from under the porch—and then he hears something crash above him. He freezes, flattening himself to the ground. Several more distinct thuds emanate from the house, followed closely by Jackson’s voice snarling, “Shit! Shit shit  _ shit shit shit shit—”  _

Okay, Sans wants his dad to come back now, please.

A moment later, Jackson bursts out of the house, slamming the door behind him. He holds a bundle of folders in his arms. Sans watches nervously as he storms farther into Hotland—anger-scent flares off of him in waves, sharp and spicy. Even after he’s vanished into the streets, Sans stays put, afraid to move and be seen, should Jackson return. After a few minutes, though, he’s beginning to think he may have time to make an escape. 

Carefully, he creeps out from under the porch, shaking dust off of his bones. He begins to bolt towards the river, but he freezes at the last moment. Jackson is gone. Jackson is gone, which means the house is—is empty. He tilts his head back in that direction, struck still with indecision. He should go home. Dad was just here, and he didn’t find anything suspicious, so that means everything is okay and Sans should just go home. He’s already going to be in enough trouble if Dad finds out he left without telling an adult. He steps towards the river, although his soul drags him back in the other direction. 

_ Papyrus,  _ he thinks, suddenly.  _ That’s what it’s called. When those plants get made into paper, it’s called papyrus. Humans used to slice it, and pound it into sheets so they could use it. Didn’t we learn about that in social studies? Papyrus...huh. _

He turns back to the house and bounds up the stairs. 

The inside of the house is simple, basic. A sparse living room, a kitchen that smells like tea and dried insects. There are jars of spiders and crayfish on the counters, alongside boxes of black tea. Farther down the hall, there’s an inconspicuous bathroom with a jar of preening oil next to the sink. The trash can is full of shed feathers. Jackson must be molting. The bedroom is equally unsuspicious. It has a perch instead of a bed, but Sans supposes that’s normal, for birds.

The only odd thing in the house is a single locked door near the back. He can feel a cold draft near the crack at the bottom, and when he presses his snout there, the science-smell intensifies. Does Jackson have a lab in his basement? Dad had talked about turning their basement into a lab several times. If there  _ is  _ a blaster, that’s where it’s going to be. Sans paces the hallway anxiously—to open the door or not to open the door? There’s no way he could find the key in time, but if he could just—

He closes his eyes and focuses. His magic sparks and swells, and he directs it to the other side of the door. A hand. He wants a hand, like his dad’s. He can’t feel with his magic, so he directs the hand to tap along the other side of the door, listening for changes in pitch. When it sounds like the hand taps metal, he assumes there’s a lock there, and fumbles with the hand until he hears the  _ click  _ of something unlocking. In the end, there are three locks on the inside of the door. There’s only one on the outside, and that one’s a simple knob lock. Sans uses his magic to rearrange the tumblrs until he hears a  _ click,  _ then pushes the door open. 

A wide set of stairs spirals into darkness below him. He trots down them, his claws clicking against the concrete. A wall sits on his left side; to his right, a wide, open area with black counters and strange, blocky machines. Cautiously, he inches forward. The counters are mostly empty—a single clean dissection tray sits near the edge of one, with a pair of small bone shears next to it. Sans swallows hard.

At the end of the counters, there’s a large machine—it reminds him vaguely of a fridge, except it has glass doors, and it’s warm. Inside, he can see rows and rows of test tubes full of shimmering red liquid. In some of the test tubes closest to the floor, he can also see tiny, floating white blobs.  _ Zygotes,  _ his mind whispers.  _ Zygotes, like Dad showed you. They have to be. _

But that—that’s impossible. Dad said there was no more DNA, right? So they can’t be  _ blaster  _ zygotes. Maybe they’re lab rats, or—or something. They’re small enough to be. On the other side of the warm fridge, there’s another line of counters. These have several papers spread across them, and a small desk chair is rolled up to one. He rears up on his hind legs to survey the papers, but finds them all too technical for him. He’ll come back, if he needs to, but there’s more to see, right now. 

At the end of that row of counters, there’s another warm fridge. This one has beakers instead of test tubes, but they’re filled with the same red liquid. Inside, there are—there are more little white shapes. The ones near the top aren’t much larger than the ones in the test tubes, but the ones near the bottom are starting to look like—like—

His bones begin to rattle.  _ No. No no no no— _

He plunges into the next room, pushing his way through a wide, unlocked door. There’s another warm fridge next to the doorway, but this one only houses four enormous beakers. Inside each beaker floats a baby blaster. One of them tilts its head when it sees him, and it smiles. He staggers away from it, nauseous with horror. He needs to go get Dad. He needs to go get Dad  _ right now— _

Something growls at him.

He freezes, the spines along his back bristling. He tears his gaze away from the beaker babies, glancing farther into the room. There are small, neat cages lined up against the wall—stacks of them, stretching higher than he can reach. On the bottom row, there are three little blasters, with an empty cage between each of them. Two of them are curled up and asleep  _ (or dead,  _ his mind hisses). One of them is awake and growling at him, its head low and its spines lifted. It tries to move towards the front of its cage, but it can’t do more than stumble a few steps in any direction before it topples over again. Unbalanced because it’s young? Or unbalanced because it’s ill?

One of the other blasters lifts its head. Its lower jaw is missing, its upper jaw warped. Milky red fluid streaks its muzzle and its cheeks. 

Sans bolts. Dad. He has to get Dad. Dad will know what to do, Dad will be able to get them all free, Dad will make this better, he has to,  _ he has to— _

The stairs creak. Sans skids to a stop, panting, and hears the basement door shut.  _ Click. Click, click, click.  _ Four locks. The overhead lights flare to life, harsh and white. Sans dives for the first hiding spot he sees—a patch of shadows beneath the counters. He struggles to keep his bones from rattling, pressing his paws over his muzzle to muffle his terrified panting. Jackson rounds the corner with a shotgun. He crouches and points the muzzle at Sans, sighing.

“Sans,” he says wearily. “God  _ fucking  _ damn it.”

Sans can’t quiet the rattle of his bones anymore—not when he’s staring the muzzle of a gun in the face. Jackson lowers it some, lets it rest on the floor. 

“What the hell are you doing here?” he asks, then shakes his head. “Fuck.  _ Fuck.  _ Not like it matters. You and your dad just can’t keep your noses out of things, can you? Did he put you up to this? Tell you to come snoop around while he kept me distracted?”

Sans immediately shakes his head. “No—! He didn’t—I—I came by myself. Please don’t be mad. I’m really sorry. I should’ve asked first, but I just, I—”

“Mad?” Jackson arches an eyebrow. “I don’t think you understand the gravity of our situation, Sans. Come out from under there.”

Sans hesitates.

“I won’t ask you again.” Jackson taps the barrel of the gun against the concrete.  _ Tap, tap.  _ “Come out from under there. Now.”

Sans creeps out from under the table, his sternum pressed flat to the ground. 

“How much did you see?”

Sans doesn’t respond. His breath feels tight in his chest.

“Too much, I suppose.” Jackson sighs again, standing and rubbing his face with a hand. His wings shift uncomfortably behind him. He gestures down the hall. “Go that way, please.”

“Why?”

“Because I told you to, and if you don’t, I’ll kill you.”

Sans believes him immediately. He slinks forward, holding his body as low as he can without dragging himself across the room. His tail clamps tightly between his legs. Jackson directs him through the room of cages and then through a thick steel door and into another room. This room houses three much, much larger cages—each one stretches from floor to ceiling. Jackson unlocks the one closest to the door, then points. 

“Step inside. You’re going to stay here until I can talk to your dad.”

Sans almost panics—once he enters that cage, there’s no way to get out. But if he  _ doesn’t _ step in, he has no doubt that Jackson will shoot him where he stands. He can taste the truth of it, something bitter and dry on the roof of his mouth. Jackson is a murderer, and Sans doesn’t want to be his next victim. He steps inside. The cage clangs shut, and Jackson steps over to a row of low cabinets, rummaging through them. 

“You’re going to tell my dad?” Sans asks, almost—hopeful. He’d rather face Dad’s fury than this man’s. 

“You bet,” Jackson says. He pulls something out of the cabinet, steps into the cage with Sans and kneels. “Come here.” 

“Why?”

“You don’t get to ask questions, Sans. You get to obey. Come here.” He holds out a thick metal band. “I’m going to put this on you to make sure you don’t go anywhere until Dr. Gaster arrives.”

Sans reluctantly slinks forward. Jackson fastens the band around his neck. It rubs uncomfortably against the spines of his vertebrae. “How long until he gets here?”

“Well, once he hears the news, I assume it won’t be very long.” Jackson steps out of the cage again, shutting it firmly behind him. “Until then, you’re going to stay right here, and you’re going to be quiet. Do you understand?”

Sans nods. If his dad will really come here, then—then maybe he’ll be okay. (But why would Jackson let his dad come here? Unless Dad—unless he knew about the blasters. Unless he thought it was okay. The thought makes Sans vaguely ill.) 

Jackson slips out of the room, leaving Sans alone. He creeps to the back of his cage and curls up there, making himself as small as possible without shifting—and he won’t shift, not while he’s in such danger. It wouldn’t help him escape, anyhow; these cages are enormous, but their bars are too closely spaced to allow even a hand through. He rests his chin on the ground, scanning the area around him. He doesn’t want to stay here. If Dad doesn’t come get him soon, he’ll—

Something scrapes against the concrete, and Sans’ head whips around. Across from him, in the cage farthest down the hall, there’s a tiny blaster. They pad across the floor, studying him cautiously.  _ Oh,  _ Sans’ soul says, warmth seeping into his bones.  _ I know you. _

“Hi,” he says, lifting his head. His tail wags—once, twice. He is absolutely certain that somehow, in some way, this little blaster is a Very Good Thing. “I’m Sans. Who are you?”

The blaster stares blankly at him. Maybe they’re too young to talk? They look kind of like Sans did when he was only a year old, and one-year-olds don’t usually have expansive vocabularies.

“Well, that’s okay,” Sans decides. “Dad says I didn’t have a name until I started talking. Most skeletons don’t, since they’re named after their fonts.”

The spines on the blaster’s back—jeez, those look razor-sharp—lift. They lower their head and begin to growl, scraping their claws across the ground. Their lower jaw clicks in warning. 

“Hey, hey, no.” Sans rolls onto his belly, dragging himself to the edge of the cage closest to the blaster. “It’s okay. I’m not gonna hurt you. I know it must be scary, living here with  _ that  _ guy, but I’m not mean like him. I’d never hurt anybody, not unless they were—they were really, really bad. And you’re not. You’re just a baby. We can be friends.” He pushes his butt into the air, wagging his tail: a playbow, the universal canine gesture of friendliness. “Friends?”

The little blaster’s growl fades. It looks...confused. 

“C’mon, you know—friends,” Sans repeats, wagging his tail hard enough to swing his haunches. He springs up, bounding in a quick circle before dropping back into his playbow. “Play? Do you know how to play?”

The blaster just stares at him. 

“Okay, maybe not.” He flops back onto his stomach before rolling over and stretching his legs out. The gesture seems to relax the blaster some, so he stays on his back, tail thumping lazily against the ground. “It’s alright. I can teach you. ‘cause we’re like—we’re like siblings, right? If we both have Dad’s DNA. We’re family.”

_ Family.  _ The word is a warm thread in his chest, and he offers the blaster—his  _ sibling— _ a doggy grin. 

“We’ll get out of here,” he says. “Once Dad comes, I’ll make sure he takes you with us, and our other siblings, too. He can’t possibly believe it’s right, letting them stay here in these cages like that. They’re kids, you know?”

(...so how is Dad going to come here? How is Jackson going to let him get to Sans without letting him see all of the awful things down here? Maybe he’ll bring Sans upstairs. But even then, how could Jackson trust Sans not to tell his dad what he saw? It just doesn’t make sense.  _ None of it makes sense.) _

“And if Dad doesn’t come,” he says, frowning—because Jackson could very well be (is probably) lying—“then I’ll just break us out of here myself. That dumb owl should know better than to ever underestimate a Gaster.”

He rolls onto his side to face the blaster. They’re still standing, still watching, but their spines have smoothed out and they seem more relaxed. Slowly, they lay down against the bars of their own cage and rest their head on the ground. 

“Tired, huh?” Sans murmurs. “I guess it is pretty late. You should sleep.”

The blaster, after a few more moments of wary observation, closes their eyes and sleeps. There’s no way  _ Sans  _ can sleep right now, so he keeps a quiet watch as minutes stretch into hours. The tiny blaster wakes up around what Sans assumes in dawn, and they return to their unabashed staring. A few minutes later, Jackson slips into the room with two bowls.

“Here,” he says, sliding one into each of their cages. The little blaster sits up straight, their tail—for the first time—wagging. “Eat.” They dive forward, burying their muzzle into the bowl. Sans creeps forward more slowly, tugging his bowl away from the door before poking unenthusiastically at it. The texture and taste are familiar, although he can’t quite place where he’s had it before.

“When’s my dad coming?” Sans asks. 

Jackson sighs, sliding down to sit against the wall at the end of the hallway. He twirls a primary feather between his fingers. “...he’s not, kid. Come on. Why would I bring him here?”

And Sans...Sans knew that, really, but the truth of it as a sudden icy weight between his ribs. If his dad doesn’t come, then he’s stuck here. If his dad doesn’t come, then—then Sans has to escape on his own, and he has to take all of his siblings with him, too. The sudden responsibility is heavier than anything he’s felt before, and his breathing begins to pick up. “You—you’re not giving me back?”

“No. I’m sorry.” He glances up at Sans, offering him an apologetic smile. “I really didn’t mean for you to get involved in all this. Your dad, now, there’s a valuable subject, but you—you’re just a kid. I already know everything about you. You shouldn’t be here.”

“So—so why don’t you send me back?” he asks, pacing along the inside of his cage. “I won’t tell anyone, I won’t—”

Jackson laughs. “Like hell you wouldn’t. Nah. I’d love to send you back, but you’d ruin everything. I’ll see if I can’t get some use out of you, but you have caused me a lot of trouble, you know? Your dad—” He sighs, letting the feather drop to the floor. “He’s never gonna stop looking for you. A guy like that, he won’t stop—not until he succeeds or he dies, and I can’t let him succeed.”

“But you can’t kill him!” Sans says, panicked. “You can’t, you can’t kill my dad, you—”

Jackson holds up a hand. “I’m not gonna kill him. Like I said, he’s valuable, but I gotta get him off my ass. He’s already suspicious, you know? What you told him…” He shakes his head. “Jeez, kid. What a mess you’ve gotten us into. But I’m gonna keep your dad alive, don’t you worry. I’m just gonna make sure he gives up; when he comes to me, it’s going to be because I want him to—so finish your breakfast. We’ve got things to do.”

Sans reluctantly finishes his breakfast, although he’s eager to get out of the cage—maybe he can find a chance to escape. Jackson isn’t armed now, as far as he can see, so he would be an easy enemy to overpower. Unfortunately, as soon as he’s finished eating, Jackson hooks a chain to the metal band around his neck. “What’s this for? I’m not gonna run,” he protests.

“No,” Jackson agrees. “You’re not.” 

He leads Sans out of the cage and over to the cabinets, pulling out a—a muzzle. Sans bristles, pulling back against the chain. “I don’t need that.”

“I don’t care. Put your mouth in.”

“Why?”

“What did I tell you about questions?”

“But I don’t want to wear th—”

Jackson yanks Sans forward, slamming the muzzle roughly onto his snout. Sans yelps, trying to surge backwards, but Jackson deftly buckles the straps behind Sans’ skull before he can. He shakes his head vigorously, ducking it to try and paw the straps off, but he’s quickly stopped when Jackson slams a foot into his spine and bowls him onto his side.

“That’s enough!” he snarls. “Quit. You see this?  _ This  _ is why training has to start so early. Can’t you just behave and do like I tell you?”

Sans stares at him, chest heaving. He’s never been—nobody’s ever—nobody’s ever hurt him like that before. He’s more startled than anything. The low throb in his back is a fierce reminder that this monster isn’t quite  _ right,  _ and that Sans needs to be very, very careful. He climbs back to his feet, keeping his head and tail low. 

“Sorry,” he murmurs. (He’s not.)

“Don’t do it again. I don’t want to hurt you, Sans. You’re not like the others.”

Sans wants to question that statement, but the ache in his back keeps his mouth shut. He follows Jackson meekly down the hallway, his eyes scanning his surroundings for any potential weakness or escape route. If he could get through the door—that would be easy, with a quick blast—he would reach the other room, and from the other room, he could get to the hallway that reaches the stairs. He could blast through the basement door, and the front door, if he needed to. After that, he’d be home free. Easy. So there’s nothing to worry about, right?

...he’s just afraid that if he tries to blast with a muzzle on, he’ll shatter his own jaw.

The room Jackson takes him to has a surgery table. Sans immediately begins to back up, but Jackson scoops him up and sets him on the table. He splays his paws, holding himself low to keep his balance on the slick surface. In his rush of fear, he forgets the pain of asking questions. “What are you doing? What’s this?”

Jackson evidently decides to be generous, because he actually answers. “My operating room. Don’t worry, I’m not doing anything awful to you.” He pushes Sans’ head to the table and places a heavy strap across his neck, pinning his head to the table. Sans strains against it, his claws skittering across the metal of the table. Jackson yanks one of his hind legs out from under him, and he crashes onto his side. His hind legs are bound and strapped to the table with brutal efficiency.

“Stop,” Sans says, scrabbling with his front legs as Jackson reaches for them. “Stop, stop, I don’t like this, let me go—”

Jackson ties his front legs together with a length of sturdy rope, then straps them to the table. “No. I’m sorry, Sans, but this has to be done.”

“What does? What are you doing?!”

“I’m docking your tail,” Jackson says, simply, and Sans’ breath freezes in his chest. That...doesn’t sound like a good thing. In fact, it sounds like an incredibly bad thing, and what Jackson says next only confirms that. “Don’t worry; it’ll only hurt for a few seconds. I’d give you a local anaesthetic, but honestly, that would hurt just as badly. If you just close your eyes and breathe through it—”

“No!” Sans shrieks. Another band, over his ribs. Another, over his spine. “No! Let me go,  _ let go—!”  _ He hauls in a breath, focuses fiercely on his magic. It begins to build in his chest, sparking and hot, because the risk of a broken jaw is worth a chance a freedom, and then—

And then the collar does something hideous and cruel, sending shockwaves of agony through his spine, all the way to his tail-tip. His magic shatters and dissipates, and he screams in terror and awful, awful pain. That is the worst thing he’s ever felt. He’s almost too scared to reach for his magic again, but then he thinks on losing his  _ tail,  _ and he reaches anyway. The pain comes again, sharp and unyielding, blowing his magic away like nothing more than a cloud of dust. He wails. 

“You won’t be able to use magic as long as that’s on,” Jackson says, pulling Sans’ tail out from between his legs and strapping it to the table. “I wouldn’t bother trying.”

“Why are you doing this? Why?!”

“It’s not to be needlessly cruel, if that’s what you’re thinking. I need your dust, and quite a bit of it. Would you rather I took a leg? An arm? I’m trying to be merciful, here. This won’t cripple you; you’ll learn to rebalance quickly enough.”

“I don’t want you to take it,” he gasps, his claws curling and uncurling. “I don’t want you to take anything. Please don’t, please just let me go, I won’t tell anybody what I saw, I  _ won’t—” _

“Mm, I’m afraid the promise of a five-year-old doesn’t mean much to me.”

“My dad’ll be angry if you do this to me. He’ll be—he’ll be really angry, he’ll hurt you, please don’t make him hurt you—”

“No, he won’t hurt me, because you know what I’m going to do with this dust?” Jackson asks, swabbing something cold and damp across Sans’ tail, only a few inches from the base. “I’m going to ruin your father with it. If he thinks you’re dead, well—he won’t have much motivation to do anything, let alone look into what  _ I’ve  _ been doing anymore. It’ll get him off my back more efficiently than anything else I could do—in a way, you being here really helped me, Sansy-boy. He’ll be much easier to manipulate after this.”

“No! No, you can’t tell him I’m dead, I have to go  _ home— _ !”

“Yeah, well, you aren’t going anywhere. Get used to it, kid. You’re staying here with me. You’ll be the first I have to use magic; think of all the things we can learn from that, Sans.”

Sans shrieks—wordless, now, in his terror. He snaps his jaws as best he can inside the muzzle, bristling his spines and straining against the straps. He tries to shift forms, to wiggle his way out of the muzzle and the bindings that way, but the collar rebukes even that use of magic sharply. He collapses against the table again, panting in dread.

“What are you so afraid of?” Jackson asks, sliding a tray beneath Sans’ tail. “The pain? It’ll be over before you know it. Look, you know that pup in the cage down from yours? 134? It’ll lay here and let me do just about anything to it. It doesn’t put up a fuss like this.”

What little control Sans has cracks at the thought of that puppy, that  _ baby,  _ being tied down and hurt and taking it because they don’t know any better. He sobs, choking on air. Tears spill down his cheeks, drip down the muzzle and onto the table. “No! You hurt them? You hurt them too?! They’re just a  _ baby—” _

“They’re an animal—and you’re only one step above them, Sans, so you’d best try to keep yourself on my good side. Now, then. Hold your breath.” Jackson lifts the bonesaw. It whirrs, low and petrifying. “Close your eyes. Breathe through it.”

The saw grinds through his bone, severs his body from itself, severs a piece of his soul, and Sans closes his eyes and screams and screams and screams.

When it’s over, he lays sobbing on the table, his body racked with tremors. Jackson moves around him, whisking away the tray full of dust and dabbing the raw tip of his stump with something cold and wet. It smells like alcohol. It stings, and he cries harder. “Dad,” he sobs. “I want my daddy! I hate you,  _ I hate you,  _ take me back to him, take me  _ back—” _

“You’re not gonna see your daddy ever again, kiddo,” Jackson says, taking one of his paws. He files the claws down to stubs, and Sans shudders and shakes and  _ hates.  _ “You’d better start getting used to that. It wasn’t so bad, though, was it? You’re being a little bit dramatic.”

Sans snarls, snapping his teeth within the confines of the muzzle. 

“Ah, ah, ah. You’d better learn not to do that. I’d hate to have to teach you the hard way. I can tell you for sure that it’s much, much worse than this.”

Sans can’t imagine anything worse. He can’t imagine any pain bigger than that awful, tearing agony as a part of him was torn away. He gags at the memory of it, and Jackson sighs and pats his shoulder. He floods the stump of Sans’ tail with healing magic, sealing the marrow back together, and then wraps it in a bandage. 

“There,” he says, unstrapping Sans and setting him back on the floor. Sans stands, his legs trembling beneath him. “All done. Heel.”

Sans glowers at him as fiercely as he can with tears in his eyes.

“Come on, I know you know basic commands,” Jackson says, tugging lightly on the chain. “Dr. Gaster spent lots of time training you.”

“What? No, he didn’t ever—”

“Yes, he did. Don’t you know, Sans?” Jackson tugs the chain again, and Sans stumbles along behind him. His weight shifts differently, without his tail to help him balance. “Your dad built you to be a weapon, and he raised you like a dog.”

“No he  _ didn’t!  _ He loves me!”

“Like a pet.”

“Like his  _ son.” _

“Sure. Whatever helps you sleep at night.” Jackson snorts, pulling him back into the cage. He undoes the muzzle, but he doesn’t bother unlatching the chain latched to Sans’ collar—he simply drops it, stepping out of the cage and shutting the door behind him. “Behave. I’ll be back in time for dinner.”

Sans curls up in the far corner of his cage again, his breath hitching. His dad loves him. He  _ does.  _ Why else would he have given Sans a piece of his soul? He’s not a dog, and he’s not a weapon. He’s  _ not.  _ He sniffles miserably, glaring at the pitiful stump of his tail. It throbs painfully, and he lets out a shuddering sigh.

God. This fucking sucks.

He hears the scrape of bony paws against concrete. The little blaster pads up the edge of their cage and looks curiously at him, and a pang of pity wrenches Sans’ soul. This is the home they’ve grown up in? This is all they’ve ever known? That sucks even  _ worse.  _ The blaster sniffs the air, and then—slowly, carefully—they drop into a playbow. Their tail wags once. 

“Heh.” Sans’ soul, for the briefest of moments, feels lighter. “Thanks, buddy.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: if sans was a pumpkin he'd be a,,,jarrahdale,,,
> 
> also!! i'm doing some Hefty Edits in the next few chapters of algernon (more than the usual punctuation/grammar stuff, oof) so the next few chapters maaaay be a little late. to make up for that, i'm going to be hosting a character q&a over on my [tumblr!](https://parsnipit.tumblr.com/post/188462229551/algernon-qa) ever wanted to ask grillby how in love he is with gaster? ever wanted to ask papyrus how he feels about being a weapon of mass genocide? ever wanted to tell sans you love him more than life itself? (me too, bud, me too.) heeeere's your chance! go toss some questions at the characters from algernon over on tumblr and i'll be answering them towards the end of this week! :D


	13. not him, not my baby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: child abduction, presumed child death, grieving**

Gaster returns home shortly after midnight. He enters quietly, hanging his overcoat up and tip-toeing through the living room. Asgore snores on the couch, and Gaster can’t help the fond smile that flickers across his face. He grabs a blanket from the linen closet and drapes it over the king’s body. Asgore stirs briefly before settling again, resuming his horrific snoring, and Gaster pats one of his horns affectionately before heading upstairs. 

He passes his own room and heads towards Sans’, first. Just a quick peek in to make sure he’s there, and safe, and okay. (Gaster’s a professional worry-wart, and he knows it.) Quietly, he cracks open Sans’ door, and the first thing he notices is  _ holy shit, his child’s missing.  _

“Sans?” His brow furrows, and he fumbles to flick on the overhead light. The bed is unmade and empty. Maybe he went to the bathroom? Though why he’d chose to do so in the middle of the night, Gaster has no idea. It isn’t as though he has a bladder. “Sans?”

He wrings his hands anxiously, and his eyes catch on the window. The screen is shredded. His soul drops, and he lunges forward, pushing the window pane up and looking down. The ground below the window stands empty and white—whatever marks may have been there have long been filled in by snow. Shit. Shit  _ shit shit— _

“Asgore!” He runs downstairs, slapping lights on as he goes.  _ “Asgore!” _

“Huhwhat’sit?” Asgore flails and rolls off of the couch, landing on the floor with a heavy  _ thump.  _ The blanket tangles around his horns as he fumbles to sit up. “What? Wingdings? What’s the matter?”

“Where’s Sans?” he demands.

“Huh? He’s upstairs.” Asgore rubs his eyes, groaning. 

“No he’s not.”

“What do you mean, ‘no he’s not’?”

“I mean he’s  _ not there,  _ Asgore. He’s not in his room—the window’s unlocked and the screen is torn. Either he left, or somebody took him.”

Asgore’s face sombers quickly, and he hauls himself to his feet. “You’re sure he’s gone? Have you checked all the rooms?”

Gaster bolts back upstairs, just in case,  _ just in case.  _ He checks his room and the bathroom while Asgore glances in the kitchen and the shed. The basement is their last visit, and it’s as empty as every other room. Gaster’s breath comes in short, choppy jerks, and his hands shake. “Where is he,  _ where is he,  _ Asgore—”

Asgore sets a heavy hand on his shoulder. “He probably tried to follow you to Jackson’s; you know he was worried.”

“Right.” Gaster sucks a breath through his teeth. “Right. I have to go back.”

“I’m going with you.”

Gaster doesn’t argue, this time. The two of them rush back to Hotland, and Gaster hammers on Jackson’s door. He hears stumbled footsteps, and then the door swings open. Jackson looks blearily at him. He’s dressed in a nightgown already. “...Dr. Gaster? Again?”

“Have you seen Sans?” Gaster asks immediately.

“What?”

_ “Have you seen—” _

“Wingdings.” Asgore steps forward, resting a hand on Gaster’s back. “Our apologies, Mr. Jackson. We know it’s late, but Sans has gone missing. We suspect he may have followed Wingdings here earlier. Have you seen him, or anything unusual?”

Jackson shakes his head, frowning. “I’m afraid I haven’t, Your Majesty. Goodness, though, that’s awful—I’m sorry I can’t be more help.”

“I’m going to look around the house,” Gaster says, bounding off of the porch and leaving Asgore to deal with their social niceties. He circles the house twice, sweeping it for any obvious signs of activity. There are scuffles in the dirt, but none that couldn’t have been made by Jackson himself, or by any other monster passing through. “Sans!  _ Sans!” _

His words bounce back at him. There is no response.

His bones begin to rattle. 

“Jackson will call us if he sees anything,” Asgore says, stopping beside him. “Wingdings, it’s going to be alright. He can’t have gotten far. There isn’t that far  _ to  _ go. In the meantime, how about we head back to Snowdin and see if the dogs can’t pick up a scent trail?”

Gaster nods fervently. “Yes. Yes, that’s a good idea. Let’s go.”

They rush back to Snowdin and head for the sentry stations. Doggo greets them first. “Hello, Dr. Gaster, Your Majesty,” he says, his tail wagging briskly. “What are you both doing out so late?”

“We need your help,” Gaster says. His hands shake as he signs. “Please. Sans is missing. Can you track him for us?”

Doggo sobers immediately. He snuffs out his smoking dog treat and nods. “Of course. Let me call the others. They’ll want to know if Sans is missing.”

Gaster nods, and Doggo throws his head back and howls—a sharp, brash sound of alert. Within seconds, several more howls answer him. He hears the Dogi bark, distantly, and before long he’s surrounded by a pack of panting, worried canines. The snow crunches under their paws as they circle him, and their breath plumes in the air, drifts of warm white smoke.

“We came as soon as we heard you,” Dogamy says. His hackles are already up. 

“So what is it?” Dogaressa asks. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s Sans,” Doggo says. “He’s missing.”

The dogs yip their alarm amongst themselves, their eyes widening. “Sans?” Lesser Dog asks, her paws tapping the snow anxiously. “He’s not the type to run off on his own. Something must be really wrong.”

“Exactly,” Doggo says. “We need to track him before the snow masks his scent completely. Dr. Gaster, how long ago did you notice he was missing?”

“It’s been barely an hour.”

“And you don’t know how long it had been since he left?” Lesser asks. Gaster shakes his head. “Then we need to hurry. There’s a blizzard coming in. We won’t have a hope of finding his trail once that hits.”

“Let’s go,” Dogarressa orders, bounding back towards town. The pack falls in behind her, and Gaster and Asgore scramble to follow them. When they get back to the house, the dogs are already working the scene, their noses low to the ground. They bark gruffly to each other on occasion, but for the most part, they work in serious silence. Gaster takes a seat on the porch, burying his head in his hands. Why isn’t there more he can do?  _ Why isn’t there more? _

Asgore sits beside him, pulling him into a hug. “All will be well,” he murmurs, and Gaster can feel the rumble of his words in his chest. “You’ll see. Don’t lose hope.”

“What if we can’t find him?” Gaster whispers, the words raw in his mouth, painful to sign. “What if he’s hurt? What if someone took him?”

“Shhh. Don’t think things like that.”

“What am I supposed to think?”

“Think of the best case scenario. We find him—maybe he’s a little cold and scared, so we wrap him up in a big blanket, and give him hot cocoa, and you scold him for three days straight.”

“Three days? Like I would go easy on him.”

“Ah, forgive me. Three weeks?”

“That’s more like it. I just—don’t understand. Why would he leave? He’s never done that before. I knew he was worried, but I didn’t think he would follow me.”

“It isn’t your fault. If it’s anyone’s, it’s—”

“It’s not yours,” Gaster says, shaking his head furiously. “It’s not. He’s clever. If he didn’t want you to catch him, you weren’t going to.”

“I should have been watching him more closely. I should have made sure he was asleep after you left. I knew he was worried, I—”

_ “It’s not your fault.”  _ Gaster glowers at him, setting his jaw. “I don’t blame you, so you don’t get to blame you, either. Let’s just focus on finding him, okay?”

“Ah.” Asgore scrubs his face. “Of course you’re right. Finding him is what’s important, right now.”

Greater Dog suddenly gives an alert bark, and their attention snaps to him. He yaps quickly with his pack. Lesser turns to them and relays, “He’s found Sans’ scent. It heads towards the river—follow us.”

The pack takes off again, bounding through the snow on all fours, and Gaster and Asgore follow close on their heels. The Riverperson’s boat rocks gently on the river, when they reach it. The Riverperson themself looks strangely somber, their hood pulled low and their shoulders slumped. Greater stops at the edge of the stream, pacing back and forth in agitation and growling quietly to himself. 

“The trail stops here,” Lesser says, her ears drooping. “He must have gone into the river. There’s no way we can follow a trail through the water.”

“Have you seen him?” Gaster asks, stepping towards the Riverperson. “Have you seen my son?”

The Riverperson looks away. 

“Please!” Gaster says, stepping into the river. It pools icily around his knees, soaks his pants to his bones. The current tugs fiercely at him. “Please,  _ please,  _ if you have, just tell me. He’s  _ five,  _ and he’s all alone, and he’s going to be scared—”

“Tra la la,” the Riverperson murmurs, their voice quiet. “There have always been two brothers in Snowdin.”

“What the  _ fuck  _ does that mean?!” He slams a fist against the side of their boat. “Have you seen him or not? Come on! You’re always on this fucking river, you have to have seen  _ something!” _

The Riverperson angles their head in his direction, and he sees the glint of one terribly sad eye. “Tra la la—your puzzles always end in Hotland, Dr. Gaster.”

“Hotland? He went to Hotland?” That makes sense. That’s where Gaster went, and Sans probably followed him there. If he wasn’t at Jackson’s, maybe he got lost somewhere along the way. “Okay. Okay, shit, thank you. Can you take us there?”

The Riverperson inclines their head. Somehow, all of them manage to cram themselves into the boat, and the current brings them swiftly to Hotland. Greater Dog springs off of the boat first, snuffling eagerly at the edges of the bank. The rest of them climb off of the boat but remain in the warm shallows, attempting to leave whatever scent might be on the bank as undiluted as possible. Time scrapes by in agonizing increments, until finally Greater Dog shakes his head. 

“He can’t find anything,” Lesser says, her tail drooping.

“We’ll try.” The Dogi jump forward, their noses to the ground as they whuff in big breaths. Each of the dogs tries for several minutes to find a scent, but at last, even they have to admit defeat.

“The water must have dampened it too much,” Doagressa says, her head low. “We’re sorry, Dr. Gaster. The trail ends here.”

“But,” Dogamy says, jumping forward, “that doesn’t mean we’re giving up. We’ll just have to do things the old-fashioned way.”

“Old-fashioned way?” Asgore asks, arching an eyebrow.

“Why, yes.” Dogamy’s tail wags briefly. “Shouting and screaming.”

With that, the dogs throw back their heads, howling noisily. Between howls, they pause, their ears pricked and straining for any response. They begin to pelt off in different directions, their howls echoing across the desert. Asgore pulls Gaster aside.

“I’m going to summon the rest of the Guard,” he says. “We’ll put out a search party. If you’ve any friends you want to help, go get them. We’ll scour the whole Underground if we have to. The dogs can take Hotland—I’ll take part of the Guard through Waterfall, and the other part will search the capital. You search Snowdin.”

Gaster nods briskly. “Very well. Call me as soon as you find anything.”

“You know I will. Now get going. Let’s find this kid so he can have some breakfast.”

Gaster whirls around to find the Riverperson, but they’ve already vanished. He groans. Fuck, he doesn’t have time for this. Instead, he summons his magic, tears a hole through the space-time continuum, and jumps through. The chill of Snowdin immediately bites him, and he hastily tugs his overcoat on before marching towards Grillby’s. 

His urgent knocking is met by a muffled crackle of flame, and then the bar’s back door swings open. Grillby wears boxers with tiny pink flames on them. He snaps yellow in surprise when he sees Gaster.  _ Gaster? What are you doing here? What time is it? _

“Two AM,” Gaster says. “Grillby, I need your help.”

_ Come in.  _ Grillby slips back into the bar, leading Gaster upstairs, into his home. He begins to tug on sweatpants and a t-shirt.  _ What’s wrong? _

“Sans is missing.”

_ What?!  _ Grillby whirls around, wide-eyed, t-shirt only halfway on. Gaster tugs it the rest of the way down for him, impatient, and Grillby obligingly shoves his other arm through the proper sleeve.

“His window was torn open tonight, and he’s nowhere in the house. The dogs tracked his scent to the river, and the Riverperson seemed to indicate—rather fucking cryptically—that he was in Hotland. The Canine Unit’s searching there, and Asgore’s taking the Royal Guard to search in Waterfall and New Home. I’m going to search here, on the off chance that he backtracked. Will you help?”

_ You know I will. Where do we start? _

“In town. I doubt he’d head into the forest on his own, but if we can’t find him here, we’ll check there.”

_ Hold on just a moment. Let me make some calls. All the patrons love Sans—you know they’ll be more than happy to help. _

“The more the better.”

In the end, they mass a sizeable force. Sans is an adored presence in Snowdin, and most of the townspeople leap at the chance to help when they realize he’s in danger. They start at the far east of the town and work their way west, towards the forest. Grillby walks on one side of the line, lighting the way as best he can, along with the townspeoples’ flashlights and lanterns. Gaster also summons several blaster heads and positions them hovering above the line in even increments, their eyes glowing fiercely and casting a haunting purple gleam on the snow as they move forward. 

They search for hours. When dawn breaks, they’ve moved from the town to the forest. The world has grown colder, and the clouds above sit thick and heavy. “Blizzard’ll be starting soon, Dr. Gaster,” Erika warns him, sniffing the air. Her tail flicks as she hops forward, flashing the white underside in an alarm signal that has her sister lolloping more quickly after her. “We’d better hurry.”

They scour through snowdrifts, between trees and underneath brambles and bracken. Thorns tug and pull at Gaster’s coat as he forces his way between two overgrown hawthorns. He tries to find the easiest path for a small skeleton to take—a small skeleton or a small blaster—which means keeping his gaze low. Every few minutes, he waves a hand and one of his blasters howls mournfully at the sky. Silence descends across their search party as they wait anxiously for a response. When there isn’t one, they move forward.

“Sans!” Gaster shouts, cupping his hand around his mouth.  _ “Sans!”  _

The forest mocks him with relentless silence. Even the birds have fallen quiet, in the face of the coming blizzard. A couple of hours after sunrise, snow begins to fall. The wind picks up, tearing mercilessly at Gaster’s jacket. He lowers his head and plunges forward. Belous stops him, a paw on his shoulder.

“Dr. Gaster,” she says, her eyes downcast. “We can’t keep going, not in the blizzard. We’ll be lost. We need to turn back while we can.”

Gaster grinds the heels of his hands into his eyesockets, sucking in a shuddering breath. He can’t force them forward, not into the blizzard, not unless he can promise to get them home safely—and he can’t. Not all of them. “No, it’s—I understand. Please, go back to town.”

“I’m sorry.” Her paw squeezes his shoulder, then slips away. “We’re all so sorry, doc.”

“Aren’t you coming?” Erika asks, stepping towards him. 

“No. I’m going to keep looking.”

“But the blizzard—even if you won’t freeze, you’ll be lost,” she protests. “Please, can’t you look once the storm has passed? It’s safer.”

Gaster shakes his head. “The first forty-eight hours are the most crucial, and I’ve already wasted—” He glances at his watch. “—ten of them. Don’t worry. I know a shortcut back.”

_ If that’s the case, I’ll go with you, _ Grillby says. 

“What? No. No, you should go. Fuku will be worried.”

_ Ipera and Mellow are watching her. She’ll be fine. She’s worried about Sans, right now; we all are. _ He sets a hand on Gaster’s back for a brief moment before resuming his signing.  _ You aren’t the only one who loves that boy, Gaster. _

Gaster drops his chin and relents. He and Grillby stand together as the snow begins to fall more heavily, the wind whipping around them, and they watch quietly as the townspeople begin to march back towards Snowdin. “Well,” Gaster says. “If there are only two of us, I don’t see any point in stumbling through the drifts any longer.”

He reaches for his magic, guides it to take shape. A full-bodied blaster crouches in front of them, resting its head on the snow. 

_ What’s this for?  _ Grillby asks, circling the blaster. 

“It can carry us through the worst of the drifts. Its legs are much longer than ours.”

_ You mean ride it? _

Gaster shrugs. “How hard can it be?”

The blaster flattens its spines, and Gaster climbs onto its back before hauling Grillby up after him. Its back is knobby and narrow, and quite distinctly uncomfortable, but as long as he keeps a tight grip, he thinks he’ll be okay. He rests his legs along its ribs, then glances back at Grillby, who crackles gray in discomfort. “I can help hold you on,” he offers.

_ Do what you must. _

Gaster flares his magic out and into Grillby’s soul, and it pings blue. 

_ Oof. That’s heavy. _

“It should help you balance. If you start to slide, I’ll readjust your weight for you, so don’t struggle.”

_ Alright. Thank you. _

“Let’s go, then.” The blaster rises to its feet, stepping easily over the drifts and lighting the way with the glow from its eyes. Around them, the wind builds into a vicious shriek of noise. Gaster puts his head down and clings to the vertebrae in front of him. He couldn’t see Sans, through this snow—but maybe he can hear him. 

“Sans!” he shouts. The blaster howls, its ribs quaking with the noise. They repeat the process every few minutes, listening desperately for a reply that never comes.

They reach the Ruins and climb off of the blaster late that afternoon. “I’ll go this way until I reach the edge of the cavern,” Gaster says. “You go in the other. Just keep your hand on the wall so you don’t get lost, and meet me right back here. The blaster will wait for you.”

The two of them split off in separate directions. Gaster heads south, his palm pressed flat against the wall of the ruins. It’s another couple of hours’ marching to reach the edge of the cavern—an arching, enormous expanse of cold stone. The Underground is not a large place, but on foot, and with a child missing, it suddenly seems vast. For a moment, he crouches in the snow, hugging his knees to his chest and taking several deep, measured breaths. Frost gathers on his bones. He hopes Sans isn’t here; it’s too cold, even for a skeleton. 

His phone rings and he fumbles to grab it, answering as quickly as he can. “Hello?”

“Wingdings,” Asgore says—he’s in Waterfall, and the look on his face isn’t encouraging. “We’ve finished scouring Waterfall. There’s no sign of him here, but all of the residents will keep an eye out. The Guard has almost finished looking through the capital, though that might take a few hours more. It’s not a small place. I’m going to join them there.”

“What about Hotland?”

“Alphys is helping the dogs search, but none of them have spotted anything yet.”

“Right.” Gaster scrubs his face. “Okay. Thanks for the update.”

“Are you still searching the forest? Isn’t there a blizzard?”

“A nasty one,” Gaster says, miserable. “I’m going to head back soon. There’s nothing here anymore, if there ever was. All his footprints, his scent—there’s nothing to track with this snowy shitfest, and if he’s heard us calling, he hasn’t answered.”

“I’m sorry, little one. Meet me in the capital; we’ll search together.”

“Right. I’ll be there in a few.”

Gaster shoves his phone back into his pocket and heaves himself to his feet. His joints creak; everything aches in the cold. He stumbles back the way he came, fingers skimming the wall, until he sees his blaster. It’s nearly buried in the snow—only the faint purple gleam of its eyes give it away. Grillby waits with it, one hand on its snout. 

_ Anything?  _ he asks.

Gaster shakes his head. “No. I’ll take you back to town, and then I’m going to head to the capital. They’re still searching there.”

_ I’ll come with you. _

“You really don’t have to. You’ve done more than—”

_ Gaster. Please. I want to find him. _

Gaster hesitates, then nods. “Very well. In that case—” He waves a hand and his blaster dissipates. With his other hand, he reaches for Grillby. “I’ll show you a shortcut to the capital.”

_ You have very many shortcuts? _

“As many as you need. Don’t let go.” He grips Grillby’s hand tightly, summons his magic—it lashes at him, unhappy with so much strenuous activity—and then tears another hole through space and time. They step through it and into the capital. The snow on his shoulders immediately begins to melt. He sways dizzily. Teleporting twice in a day doesn’t sit well with him at the best of times; doing it on a empty stomach, with a companion, after hours of trekking through a blizzard? It sits even more precariously. 

_ You need to eat,  _ Grillby says.

“I don’t have time—”

_ We  _ both  _ need to eat. Come on. We won’t help anyone if we’re collapsing halfway through the capital. Let’s just grab something to go. _

The idea of food revolts him, but he purchases a blackberry starfait and wolfs it down anyway. A means to an end, he tells himself. It’s a means to an end, and that’s all. He  _ does  _ feel better, once he’s eaten it. His magic quits prickling quite so painfully, and his joints feel warm and smooth again. Grillby’s flames lick higher, bright and steady. For the briefest of moments, he actually feels a little bit hopeful. They’ll find Sans soon. They have to.

Then his phone rings.

“We’re headed your way right now, Your Majesty,” Gaster says when he answers—and then he pauses, because the king’s face looks grave. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Alphys found something,” Asgore says. “She wants us to meet her in Hotland at once.”

“At her lab?”

“Yes.”

“What did she find?”

“She wouldn’t say, but she didn’t sound happy. I’ll meet you there—maybe it’s a clue.” 

Somehow, Gaster doesn’t think it’s anything quite so benevolent. He takes off, Grillby at his heels, and races to Alphys’ lab. He skids through the automatic doors, the chill of artificially-cooled air immediately overtaking him. Chalky red dust coats his shoes.

“Dr. Alphys?” he calls. 

“I’m here, Dr. Gaster.” Alphys rushes down the escalator, her hands held close to her chest. Her eyes are overbright. Her lower lip trembles. Gaster’s soul begins to fall to pieces—a slow, inevitable destruction. “I—I found something you n-need to look at. Dogamy found it outside, about an hour ago, under the—” Her voice cracks. When she speaks again, it’s a whisper. “Under the lasers.”

A slow, creeping numbness weighs heavily on his shoulders. He staggers up the escalator. Somehow, he already knows what he’s going to find. On Alphys’ worktable, there’s a small ceramic bowl. The bowl is filled with dust; soft, chalky gray flakes. Not much. Not enough for a blaster, but enough—

Enough for a five-year-old skeleton with a smile big enough to break the world. 

“No,” Gaster whispers. “It’s not him. It’s someone—some _ thing  _ else, it’s not him. This is a mistake.”

Alphys shakes her head. Tears rim her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I’m s-so sorry, but it is—it is his. I checked it against his data in the g-genome library b-before I called Asgore. I didn’t want to scare you f-for nothing; I had to be sure. That’s him. That’s Sans. I’m so—I’m so, so sorry, Dr. Gaster.”

Gaster rests his hands next to the bowl. His fingers tremble. “No,” he repeats. They can’t understand him, if he doesn’t lift his hands. He doesn’t care. “You’re wrong. It can’t be him. He was—” 

He was just here. He was just laughing and smiling, racing around the lab in a tiny whitecoat and oversized goggles. He was just begging for another bedtime story before his daddy left for the night. He was just giggling as Asgore squeezed him into a hug. He was just—he was just—

Gaster wraps his hands around the bowl and pulls it closer. It’s so insignificant. This dust? This is a person? This is supposed to be his son? It’s impossible. All of that life, that infectious grin and contagious laughter, those bad jokes and afternoon naps, that insatiable appetite and hungry mind, all of  _ that— _ how can it fit in this little bowl? It’s not possible. It’s just not possible. 

“Alphys?” Asgore. Downstairs. Out of breath. “Alph—”

“Upstairs, Your M-Majesty,” Alphys says, hurriedly wiping her eyes. Beside her, Grillby is—dark blue at the edges. Huh. Gaster’s only seen him...that color...once before…

His knees threaten to buckle. He pulls the bowl to his chest and sits down, tucking himself against the wall. He doesn’t want to be touched. He doesn’t want to be seen. He doesn’t want to be in this moment.

“What is it?” Asgore says, staggering up the last few stairs. He’s panting. “What’d you find? What’s—Wingdings? What’s wrong? Are you—?”

Alphys sets a hand on his arm. She doesn’t say anything, but the look on her face must be enough for Asgore.

“What?” he asks. His voice cracks. “What? Alphys—no. No, he can’t be—”

“I’m sorry.” Alphys sounds almost as broken as Gaster feels. “It’s him. We found him under the l-lasers. He must have gotten hurt, t-trying to get across—”

Asgore drops to his knees next to the table. His eyes fix on the dust. “Sans,” he whispers.

“No,” Gaster says. “It’s not him.”

The king bows his head. His heavy shoulders stoop forward. For a moment, he kneels there in silence, his breath hitching. Then, slowly, he picks himself back up. His breath shakes. “Goddamnit,” he whispers. Then a shout, a roar, a whirlwind of anger:  _ “God fucking damn it!” _

He whirls around—drives his claws through the wall, leaves four terrible gouges in his wake. Alphys steps out of his way, clutching her tail to her chest, her eyes wide. The king tears through the upper level of the lab, toppling bookshelves and scattering tools, but never once—never  _ once— _ does he near Gaster or Alphys. Gaster is grateful for that, in some distant way. But he’ll have to help repair the room, won’t he? Have to...do that, sometime soon...

Grillby slips down the escalator. The ground sizzles beneath his shoes. He isn’t shaped quite right anymore.

As life falls apart around him, Gaster peers down into that dust. He doesn’t feel much of anything. If this really is his son, he supposes that makes him a bad person. He should be flipping his shit, shouldn’t he? He should be like Asgore, raging against the injustice of the world. Instead, he sits, and he hugs this bowl to his chest, and he struggles to breathe through the impossibility of it. His son? Sans?  _ Dead?  _ That isn’t possible. Gaster was supposed to be dead long, long before Sans ever thought about dying. 

...they should really get back to searching for him soon, shouldn’t they? He’s probably scared. He never did like being alone. Gaster can’t blame him—he left him alone far, far too often when he was a baby. It wasn’t fair. It isn’t fair. Once Gaster finds him, he’s never leaving him alone again. Never ever. 

Asgore stops. He stands panting in the middle of the room. There are splinters in his fur and tears on his cheeks. “It’s not fair,” he says, wretched. “It’s just not fair.”

No. Gaster supposes it isn’t. He stands up, clutching the bowl. “I’m going to the lasers,” he says. Asgore stares at him. He supposes he should sign, but he won’t remove his hands from the bowl. Not for anything. “I’m going to search past them.”

“Wingdings—”

Gaster heads down the escalator and towards the lab’s back door. Asgore follows him. 

“Wingdings, please,” he says. “Listen to me. I know it’s—difficult to understand, but—”

“He’s good at solving puzzles. He wouldn’t have been killed by lasers,” Gaster says. The weight of the bowl is an impossibility in his arms. “He knew how they worked. He’s still out there.”

Asgore sets a hand on his shoulder. “Please, little one—”

Gaster’s magic lashes out before he’s even thought about. It wraps itself around Asgore’s soul, and he hears it ping blue before he realizes what he’s done. Once he does realize it, he doesn’t see much reason to stop. He shoves Asgore away from him, pushes him to the far side of the room with his magic. The king thuds into the wall. “Please don’t touch me.”

He can’t handle it right now. He can’t handle anything right now. 

He steps out of the lab, and the dogs are there. They’re huddled together, their heads bowed and their tails drooping. They’re crying. He’s never seen a dog cry. 

“You don’t have to cry,” he tells them. “It’s okay.”

“Oh, Dr. Gaster,” Dogaressa whispers. She doesn’t understand. “Sweetheart, we’re so sorry.”

“Why are you sorry? He’s still out there. He has to be. The lasers wouldn’t have killed him. He’s too smart for that. This is all just a big mistake.”  _ Mistake,  _ he signs, tearing his hand away from the bowl for just a moment.  _ Mistake.  _

Dogamy chokes on a whine. He lays on his stomach and puts his paws over his snout, shaking. Lesser curls up tightly against his side. Greater paces back and forth, staggering along the walkway. He sounds like he’s dying.

“No,” Dogaressa says, padding towards him. Her eyes are unbearably sad. “It’s no mistake. The smell is his. Dr. Alphys says the genes are his. That’s Sans, my dear. He’s gone.”

The whole world is ending. “No. He’s not. Don’t say that.”

Dogaressa sits down next to him, leaning her head against his knees. “Sans is dead.” Simple. Ruthless. She slices his soul open with three words. His knees buckle, and he kneels in the dry Hotland dust, clutching the bowl tightly to his sternum. His soul. One little, vibrant piece of his soul, snuffed out, just like that. 

“No,” he whispers, rocking himself. “No, no no no no he’s not. He can’t be. Not Sans, not him, not my baby.”

Dogaressa whines softly, pressing her head to his. He struggles to focus on sensation. Warm, wiry fur. The stink of dog breath and dry land. The endless bubble of magma below them. The smooth texture of ceramic beneath his fingers. Salt. He tastes...salt. Tears roll off of his jaw and splatter into the dust he cradles. When did he start crying? 

“Oh, pup,” Dogaressa murmurs. She touches her nose to his cheek, and when he doesn’t pull away, she licks the tears from his face. She ceases to speak in Common—she speaks instead in the language of dogs, in the language of tails and ears and animal noises. That’s alright. Gaster doesn’t need to know her exact words; her intent is clear enough. She’s hurting. They’re all hurting, and they all want to help him.

Dogs are so good. No one deserves dogs. Not monsters, not humans, not anyone. Certainly not him.

He hunches over, pressing his forehead to the ground and hugging the bowl of dust hard enough that it hurts. “Not Sans,” he repeats, his shoulders shaking. “Not my baby, not my little boy, not him, no no no no—”

The lab door whooshes open behind him. Cold air chills his spine. Asgore kneels next to him in the dirt, but doesn’t touch him. Alphys kneels on his other side, her tail curling behind them. Together, they begin to grieve.

On the edges of Snowdin Forest, a fire rages.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: it's halLOWEEN!! one year for halloween, sans weaseled gaster into dressing up as a hotdog. do with this mental image what u will.
> 
> but seriously, happy halloween, everybody!! i hope u have fun and get lots of treats if u celebrate!!!


	14. dark, darker, yet darker

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: suicidal ideation, grieving, mentions of violence and death, unethical experimentation, child abuse/neglect**

“Congratulations, Sans,” Jackson says, sliding a bowl of food through a slot near the bottom of his cage door. Sans drags it away from the door, glowering. “You’re a dead man.”

“You did it?” Sans asks. His tail would be twitching with irritation if, you know,  _ he still had one. _

“Sure did, champ. Asgore made the announcement this evening. The search parties were all called off a couple of hours ago.”

Sans’ soul sinks. His dulled claws flex against the concrete. “...are they okay?”

“Who?”

“Everyone. My dad. My friends. Asgore, Alphys, Grillby. Are they okay?”

Jackson shrugs, sliding two bowls into 134’s cage—one filled with more of that odd meat mash, and one filled with a bright red solution. 134 falls eagerly upon the solution, snapping the liquid up in messy bites. “Still alive and healthy. They’re grieving, but most of them will get over it. Your dad’s taking it hard, but that’s to be expected. I think I’ll go bring him some casserole tomorrow. A condolence gift, you know? Kinda cliche, but it should keep him off of my back. Although, I’ve been thinking…” He drums his fingers against his chin. “He may just fall down, now that he has so little to live for. I mean, his lifespan is already limited—and that’s even  _ more  _ of a waste. A great mind like that, giving away his immortality for a lab experiment.” He sighs. “It really is too bad. He could have done great things, if it weren’t for you.”

“What do you mean?” Sans asks, his attention snapping away from his dinner.

“Don’t you know how souls are made, Sans?”

“They’re made from other monsters’ souls.”

“Exactly. A parent removes of piece of their soul, merges it with somebody else’s, creates a baby soul. The baby soul feeds off of ‘em until the parents wither away. Children are  _ parasites.  _ Your dad could’ve lived forever, but he decided to give his life to you. You’re killing him, Sans. Every moment you spend alive is another moment he  _ won’t _ get to spend.”

“You’re lying.”

Jackson shrugs. “Can’t prove I’m not, but I’m not.”

“If that was true, then you’d just kill me to keep my dad alive, right? If you think he’s so  _ valuable, _ ” Sans says, chomping another bite of mash in victory.

“Mm, nope. Dr. Gaster’s a bit too much of a threat to let live  _ forever, _ at this point.” Jackson scratches the back of his neck thoughtfully. “If he discovered what I was doing here, he’d take me straight to the king, and I wouldn’t get off lightly. People just aren’t ready to accept this kind of work; they’ll only appreciate the final product. But at the same time, I really don’t want him to die so soon. A few more years would be ideal, but—well, I just don’t think we’ve got that kind of time, as long as he thinks you’re dead.”

“I have no idea what you mean,” Sans says, “but my dad isn’t gonna die. He’s sad, but it’s not gonna  _ kill  _ him.”

“It might. Nobody’s seen Asgore since he made the announcement—rumor’s going around that he’s too busy trying to keep his Royal Scientist alive to put in an appearance anywhere else. Monsters can die of grief, you know. Our souls are sensitive.”

Sans eyes Jackson’s own chest with disbelief. “Uh-huh.”

“Anyway, I guess you don’t care much about my plans. I’m gonna head out for the night, but I’ll see you two in the morning.” He strolls in 134’s direction, picking a remote up off of the counter. 134 winces when they see the remote, skittering away from the cage’s door. “134, you’re on guard tonight. Don’t let the little guy escape or I’ll cut your head off, ‘kay?”

Sans is instantly alert, alarm flaring in his chest. “What are you doing to them?” he demands, pacing along the side of his cage closest to 134. “What’s that?”

Jackson turns a dial on the remote. The pup’s eyes widen and they arch their back, scrabbling at the floor with their claws. Their mouth opens in a silent wail of agony, the spines along their back bristling in a useless attempt to scare off the pain. Sans runs along the edge of the cage, his eyes wide and frantic.

“Stop! Stop it, you’re hurting them,  _ stop—” _

“They’ll be fine,” Jackson says, setting the remote back on the counter. “It only lasts a few minutes. G’night, you two.”

He flicks the lights off as he leaves, and Sans watches helplessly as the pup staggers around their cage, clawing at their own bones. Magic froths white around their teeth, dripping and splattering onto the floor in fat droplets. Their eyelights blaze red. They mouth at their own paws as their bones begin to twist and warp. It looks almost like—like shifting, Sans thinks, but the form doesn’t  _ change,  _ it just gets bigger. Much, much bigger.

It’s awful to watch. It’s hideous, and wrong, and cruel, and when it’s over, the pup lays curled up and cramped in their cage. Their eyes are dull, their limbs rattling with excess energy. They look utterly miserable, and it  _ kills  _ Sans to see. He continues to pace along his cage, frustrated by the distance between them. The pup doesn’t even acknowledge his existence—they just lay there, breathing hard. When Sans whines at them, they shift their head slightly in his direction and growl irritably.

“I’m sorry, buddy,” Sans whispers, pressing his skull to the cage bars. He drops back into his first font—his father’s font, the one that always comforts him through nightmares and bad days. “I’m so sorry. I’m—I’m gonna get us out of here, okay? He won’t be able to hurt you anymore.”

The pup doesn’t look comforted by this at all. They look blankly at him, their eyelights shivering within their sockets. Too much. It’s all too much. Sans’ haunches buckle beneath him, and he leans heavily against the cage. 

“I’ll get you somewhere better,” he promises, his voice cracking. He feels so very small and weak—but he cannot be, not any longer. There’s someone he has to help. “I’ll get you home. There’s a whole world out there, full of—of awesome places and incredible people. You’ll love them.”

The pup sighs heavily, their paws twitching. Sans’ soul aches—perhaps he can’t make their physical pain abate, but maybe he can take their mind off of it. If he can do that, he can feel like he has  _ some  _ control of the situation. (If he can do that, he can stop thinking about dying and hurting and never seeing his family ever again.)

“Like, um—like Uncle Asgore. Everybody loves him,” Sans continues, laying down and folding his paws in front of him. He scans the room as he talks, making note of as many details as he can. Something’s going to help them out of here, if he’s only clever enough to figure out  _ what  _ and  _ how _ . “He’s the king of monsters, and he’s really nice. He likes gardening a lot, and cooking, but he’s—well, he’s kind of bad at cooking, so he eats at restaurants a lot. Sometimes he takes me and my— _ our  _ dad with him.” He huffs out a weak laugh. “I guess I should tell you about our dad, huh? Man, where would I even start?”

Slowly, the pup sits up, hunching over to keep their head level with his. Their eyelights are piercing, unnaturally bright and large in their sockets. An excess of magic, no doubt. That’s the only way they could maintain a form this large without a soul of their own. He expects them to growl again, but they don’t. They sit. They listen.

“Dad’s name is Wingdings Gaster, but he hates when people call him Wingdings. Only Asgore gets to do it, really. Mostly people just call him Dr. Gaster. He’s the Royal Scientist; he designed the Core a long time ago. He’s super smart, and he really loves math and physics and stuff. I like math too, but I also  _ love  _ astronomy. That’s the study of the universe and celestial objects, like stars and planets and things.”

The pup yawns, displaying gleaming rows of unnaturally sharp fangs. Their eyeteeth are longer than Sans is tall.

“Yeah, I guess maybe it’s boring, if you don’t understand it. I wonder what kind of things you’d like to study.” He sets his head on his paws. “I bet you like learning things, too. I mean, you  _ are  _ a Gaster.”

The pup’s sockets begin to lid.

“Tired, huh?” Sans murmurs. “Me too. My dad usually reads me bedtime stories, but I bet you’ve never heard one of those. Maybe I can remember one.”

He rolls onto his back, thinking. Dad reads him lots of different books about lots of different things. He wonders which one this pup will be most interested in. Something simple and quick, he guesses—although he’s fairly certain the pup doesn’t understand him, anyway. They clearly understand commands in Common, but Wingdings is undoubtedly foreign. (Sans likes that better. He doesn’t want to speak to the pup in the language that’s been used to abuse them)

“Oh, I know! How about  _ The Giving Tree?”  _ he offers. “That was one of my favorites, when I was little—or littler, anyway. I don’t quite remember it word-for-word, but I can give it a good shot.” He clears his throat, then begins. “‘Once there was a tree, and she loved a little boy. And every day, the boy would come and he would gather her leaves and make them into crowns and play king of the forest. He would climb her trunk and swing from her branches and when he was tired, he would sleep in her shade. And the boy loved the tree very much…’”

When he finishes the story, he expects the pup to have drifted to sleep—instead, they’re watching him. They’re clearly tired, their eyesockets still lidded heavily and their shoulders slumped, but they seem reluctant to rest. Their tail twitches with anxious energy.

“What?” Sans asks. “You want another one?”

And who is he to say no to a kid who’s never had a bedtime story before?

“Alright, alright, this one’s  _ Guess How Much I Love You.  _ ‘Little Nutbrown Hare, who was going to bed, held on very tight to Big Nutbrown Hare’s ears. He wanted to be sure that Big Nutbrown Hare was listening. “Guess how much I love you?” he asked. “Oh, I don’t think I could guess that,” said Big Nutbrown Hare…’”

As long as the pup stays awake, Sans is content to tell him bedtime stories. When the pup’s eyes finally drift shut, Sans’ voice is worn and rough, but he’s glad—he’s glad he could do something for his sibling. He curls himself up close to the cage wall (as close as he can get to 134) and fits his teeth around the chain attached to his collar. He gnaws on it until his teeth ache and a sour, metallic taste coats his mouth. He falls asleep with it still in his jaws.

Several hours later, he’s awoken by the flickering of fluorescent lights. He groans and rolls over, scraping his paws over his eyesockets.  _ Just five more minutes, Dad. Five more minutes… _

“Rise and shine, Sansy,” Jackson says, and he hears the rasp of a bowl being slid into his cage. “Breakfast time.”

Sans rolls onto his feet, dragging his bowl back into his cage. He’s starting a collection. As he eats, Jackson ambles over to 134’s cage, glancing them over. “What?” Sans asks. “Don’t they get breakfast, too?”

“Nah, not when they’re like this. The concentrator provides everything they need.”

“The what?”

“Concentrator. Fancy little project.” He nods at the black box on the back of the pup’s neck, just above their shoulders. “Provides all the magic it needs to sustain itself, for a limited amount of time. It’ll get smaller as it uses up the magic, and once it’s small, it’s easier just to feed it regularly then to replace the solution in the concentrator all the time. A hassle, that, and they don’t enjoy it very much.”

“Why don’t they have their own magic?” Sans asks, studying the empty black space between 134’s ribs. They breathe quietly in their sleep, untroubled. “Their own soul?”

“Souls are far too difficult and costly to make. It doesn’t need one; if it had one, if would be like you.”

“Like me?”

Jackson shrugs. “Worthy of some nominal respect. But without a soul, it’s not even an animal, really. It’s just a thing. You can do anything to it; what does it care?”

“I don’t think that’s true. You don’t have to have a soul in order to—to be respected.” He frowns. “I mean, lots of things don’t have souls and you’re still supposed to respect them. Like furniture, or somebody’s work, or flowers.”

“What do you know?” Jackson asks, laughing. “You’re five.”

“I’m just  _ saying.  _ Why’s it matter if someone has a soul?”

“A soul is what allows monsters to give and receive love. If a monster doesn’t have a soul, they’re no better than a human. Without love, they become full of rage and hate and greed.”

“Nuh-uh. Even if you can’t feel love, you can still feel good things.” He glances at 134. “You can still feel fear and pain. Isn’t that worth something? Feeling love can’t be the end-all be-all of being a monster. It’s what you do that matters. I mean, look at you. You  _ have  _ a soul, and you’re still a huge piece of shit.”

Jackson snorts. “Okay, kid. I get it. You hate me. But hey, quick question—” He leans back against the counter, cocking his head. “What kind of casserole’s your dad like?”

“You know what? I think he’d  _ really  _ enjoy it if you put me in a casserole dish and took me back to him. I can dislocate my bones. I bet I’ll fit, no problem.”

“Eh, maybe not. I’ve only got an eight-inch square pan.”

“You’re making an eight-inch square pan casserole for a grieving man? Coincidentally a grieving man who’s one of the smartest individuals in the Underground, close friends with most government officials and  _ also  _ the man you’ve tricked into thinking his kid is dead? Trust me, now is not the time to be skimpy. Invest. At least get a nine by thirteen.”

“Man, I’m glad I didn’t give this thing a soul,” Jackson says, laughing and hooking a thumb at 134.

“Why?”

“‘cause then I’d be worried it would be like you—a witty little upstart. I kinda like you, kid, not gonna lie. That makes what I’m gonna do these next few months so much harder.”

Sans bristles. 

“Hey, don’t get me wrong, it’s not gonna be _that_ bad. Like I said, you’ve got a soul; you aren’t like the others, so I’m not gonna treat you like ‘em. I’m not evil.” Jackson scoops up a muzzle and steps into the cage, kneeling in front of Sans. “But we don’t waste resources here, and you’re definitely a resource. Come here. Muzzle.”

Sans balks, backing up until his rump hits the corner of his cage. Jackson reaches forward, grabbing his chain and hauling him forward again.

“I’ll explain this once, Sans,” he says. “When I say ‘muzzle,’ it means you put your nose in this muzzle and let me fasten it. If you don’t, I’m going to hurt you. I don’t want to hurt you. Be reasonable.” He holds up the muzzle again. “Muzzle.”

Sans hesitates, shifting his weight uncomfortably. If he puts his muzzle in, he knows he’s condemning himself to something unpleasant. On the other hand, if he  _ doesn’t  _ put his muzzle in, he’s probably doing the exact same thing. But if he goes with Jackson, at least he’ll get a chance to see more of the lab—and more data is never a bad thing. More knowledge of the lab means a more viable escape attempt.

He slides his nose into the muzzle.

“Atta boy, Sans. Let’s go.”

Jackson leads him out of the cage, and 134 lifts their head and spares him a curious glance as he passes by. Sans pads reluctantly down the hallway, his head low and his eyes hungrily skittering over his surroundings. They pass through the room of small cages (the warped-jaw pup is gone; Sans wonders what happened to them) and into another room. This one is fairly large, made of sturdy concrete and reinforced steel. 

“Right. First things first,” Jackson says, locking the door behind them before removing Sans’ muzzle and wrapping the chain around his spine so it won’t drag along the ground. “I want to see what kind of magic you can use. I’m going to deactivate your collar, but I can reactivate it quicker than you can form an attack, so no funny business, okay? If you try to hurt me, I’ll hurt you back a hundred times worse. Believe me.”

Oh, Sans believes him. “So what do you want me to do?”

“What  _ can  _ you do? Blasts, I assume.”

Sans nods.

“Show me one.” Jackson points at the far wall. He slips his hand into his pocket, and Sans’ collar beeps and blinks red. The first idea that jumps into Sans’ head, naturally, is to blast the shit out of Jackson and run—but if Jackson really  _ can  _ reactivate the collar that quickly, Sans doubt he’ll be fast enough to get a blow in before he’s writhing on the ground in pain. Jackson won’t be so quick to trust him again, but maybe if Sans can get him off-guard first…

He braces his paws against the ground and arches his back. Magic begins to build between his ribs, sparking and cracking in white glimmers of light. Jackson stares, rapt, and Sans feels a familiar burn racing along his chest and throat. He doesn’t let it build to its full potential—best keep  _ that  _ a secret. Instead, he releases it before it’s ready, opening his jaws and letting his magic surge forward. It slams into the wall with a booming  _ crash,  _ leaving a sizzling black patch in its wake. Sans cocks his head. The steel is dented, the concrete cracked. Oops.

(On the bright side, that means if he  _ can  _ get away from Jackson and this collar, it’ll be the easiest thing in the world to blast his way through the doors and walls.)

“Wow,” Jackson says, scribbling something down on his clipboard. “That’s impressive, I gotta say. No wonder Dr. Gaster wanted to use you as a weapon. What’s your AT?”

“Don’t know.”

“Well, we can fix that.” He rummages through one of the cabinets near the side of the room, pulling out a small soul scanner. He scans Sans’ soul, then grins. “Jeez, lookit you. AT 25, DF 15, HP 50. Nice—and I bet it’ll only get higher, the older you get. Do you have any other attacks? Skeletons use blue magic, right?”

“Blue magic?”

“Yeah, you know—when you turn somebody’s soul blue, manipulate the gravity around them. Have you ever done that?”

Sans squints. Hell yes, he’s used blue magic (he used it to break into this damned lab in the first place), but he’s not telling  _ Jackson  _ that. “...not for a long time.”

“Try it on me. Gently.”

Sans struggles to condense his magic—blue magic is more difficult than a blast, more precise. He hasn’t exactly gotten to practice it, either. Dad’s insistent that he doesn’t need to learn to fight. (For a moment, Sans regards that insistence bitterly. If Dad had only taught him to fight, it would be infinitely easier to get out of this situation.) After a moment of fussing, Sans finally gets Jackson’s soul to ping blue. Jackson staggers under the weight, grinning. 

“Damn, I hope 134 can do that, when it’s older. Biologically, you’re very similar, so I think it’s a likely hope. You know he came from you, instead of your dad,” Jackson says, rolling his shoulders as he adjusts to the weight. Sans thinks about slamming him into the nearest wall, but resists the urge. Not yet. Not yet.

“What do you mean?”

“Your dad used DNA from his own bone scraping to make you, but he didn’t save the rest of the scraping. Luckily, I found a piece of bone he carved out of you years ago—” Jackson kneels and taps Sans’ sternum, the ridges of bone that don’t quite fit the way they should. “The nucleic acids were butchered by the preservative, but with some ingenuity and elbow grease, I managed to repair most of the genome. I used your DNA to create all the blasters here.”

“It doesn’t make a difference,” Sans says, though the thought still unnerves him. He refuses to let that show—he doesn’t want to give Jackson the satisfaction. “We’re all just clones of the same person, in the end.”

“More or less. The only difference is that your genome has an activate blaster phenotype that’s easily morphed with magic,” Jackson says. “That’s the valuable part. Having your genome cut out a lot of the hard work for me. Unfortunately, I think I’m gonna have to figure out how to activate the blaster phenotype anyway.” He sighs. “Ah, well. I have your dad’s notes. He writes damn good lab reports, that guy, so hopefully it won’t be too hard to follow.”

“Why do you need to do that? Surely you haven’t used up all of my DNA yet,” Sans says. 

“Nah, I still have plenty more—but this time, I’m not making something new.”

“What do you mean?”

“Never mind, kid. Hey, try lifting me with your magic.”

“No,  _ what do you mean?”  _

“What did I say about questions? I’ll indulge you sometimes, but I think I’ve said enough for now. Let’s get back to work.”

Sans tightens his grip on Jackson’s soul. He could slam him against the ceiling, break his spine, his ribs, wring his soul until he cries for mercy. For a moment, he’s sorely tempted—but no. Not yet, not yet, not yet. It’s becoming a mantra. Patience. He closes his eyes. When he opens them, his irises shine blue. 

“What’s that mean?” Jackson asks, cocking his head. Sans obligingly lifts him a few inches off of the floor before setting him back down. “The color of your irises when they glow? Dr. Gaster’s are purple, yours are blue. Do all skeletons have different colors?”

“I don’t know. I’ve only met one other skeleton.”

“Ah, I suppose that’s right. Did Dr. Gaster ever tell you what it meant?”

Sans shakes his head. 

“Too bad. You can let go now.” Jackson waves a hand at his soul, and Sans releases the grip of his blue magic. For the next hour, Sans runs through as much of his magic as he can—which isn’t much. The only thing he truly knows how to use are his blasts and his blue magic; he can’t form any reasonable attack or defense. Jackson attempts to teach him some, but since their magic is vastly different (Jackson uses purple instead of blue), it doesn’t work well. The most Sans manages to do is make a shapeless white blob he can fling through the air at minimal speeds.

“Oh, well,” Jackson says cheerfully. “That’s good information to know. I’ll have to edit my training program for the others. One last thing, and then I’ve gotta head to work.” He crouches, offering Sans a test tube. “Put some of your magic in here. Just form a little attack and direct it.”

Sans obediently forms a tiny blob attack, guiding it into the test tube, which is promptly capped. “We’re done?”

“Yep,” Jackson says, picking up the muzzle. Sans slides his nose in without being asked, and Jackson beams. He clicks a button, and Sans’ collar flashes green again. “Atta boy.”

Sans wants to bite his face off.

Jackson leads him back to his cage. As they walk, Sans memorizes the layout of the hallways and rooms, his paws scraping across the concrete. When Jackson releases him, he curls up in the far corner of his cage, resting his chin on the floor. 134 lifts their head to peer at him, and Sans wags his miserable stump of a tail as best he can. It still stings.

“Have a good day, you two,” Jackson says, waving as he slips out of the room. 

“Ugh,” Sans says, as soon as the door shuts. “I can’t stand him.”

134 sighs softly. Sans decides to pretend it was in agreement.

“I mean, this kind of science is just inhumane,” he says, slapping a paw against the ground. “Experimenting on  _ kids?  _ Hurting them? Locking them in  _ cages?  _ That’s just bad science, buddy. Don’t let Jackson fool you. Real science is so much better.”

134 studies him uncertainly.

“Hey, come on, I’m serious,” Sans says. “Don’t look at me like that. I’ve been in a  _ real  _ lab before, and it’s nothing like this.” He lays down, pressing his nose to the chilly bars of his cage. “But I guess you must be sick of science by now. Let’s talk about something different. How about, um—the outside. Have you ever been outside? Have you ever been to Snowdin? That’s where I live. Me and Dad have this awesome house…”

He spends most of the day regaling 134 with details of the outside world. Sometimes 134 listens. Sometimes they pace tiny, agitated circles in their cramped cage. Sans is fine with either one. His own lack of rest catches up with him late in the afternoon, and he finally succumbs to his exhaustion and lapses into sleep. He dreams of the cold, of snow and twinkling lights and his dad’s steady hands. He dreams of going home.

* * *

Breathe in. Breathe out. 

How can something so small hurt so much? He only created Sans six years ago. Six years. It’s no time at all, especially when compared to the rest of his lifespan. He’s not ancient, but he’s not young, either. How can six years change so much? How can six years make him hurt so  _ fucking much  _ when centuries failed to?

Breathe in. Breathe out.

His joints ache. He’s cold, but moving beneath the blankets takes too much energy. He stares at the wall—he’d taken shelter in Sans’ bedroom as soon as he’d gotten home. Several messy, scribbled pictures of rocketships and stars and mice cover the walls. The pillows smell like his son. The bowl of dust (his little one’s dust, his baby boy, his  _ baby)  _ is clutched tightly to his chest, and he curls himself around it. He’ll slaughter the first person who tries to take it from him. No one can take him. No one can take his baby from him, never again, never fucking ever.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Footsteps on the stairs. The creak of his bedroom door. “Wingdings?” Asgore’s voice. He sounds almost as awful as Gaster feels. Almost. “Hey. Alphys made some soup. You should try some.” The bed shifts as he sits down. He smells warm fur and chicken broth. He presses his face to the pillows, blocks out everything but Sans’ scent. (How long until that, too, fades? How long until it leaves him forever?) “I know you aren’t hungry, but you’ve got to keep your strength up.”

Breathe in. Breathe out.

“...Wingdings? Please?”

Breathe in. 

“I can’t,” he says. The words ring in his skull. Too loud, too much, too close. He digs his fingers into the side of the bowl, signing sharply with his magic.

Breathe out.

“You must,” Asgore says. The light glints off of his horns. They’re duller than usual. He must have forgotten to polish them. “Sans wouldn’t want you to—”

“Sans isn’t here to want anything.” Gaster’s voice is sharper than he wants it to be, and Asgore flinches. “Don’t use him against me.”

Breathe in, in, in. Breathe out, out, out.

“I’m sorry,” Asgore whispers. “I don’t mean to. I know it hurts, little one. Stars, trust me, I know—but you can’t give up hope. Your friends need you.  _ I  _ need you.”

“Please leave me alone.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

Breathe in. Breathe out.

“I don’t want you to die,” Asgore says. His voice trembles. His hands shake, and he sets the bowl of soup aside before he spills it. “I can’t lose you too. You have to live.”

...no. He doesn’t, really.

Breathe. Breathe, breathe,  _ breathe. _

“He can’t be dead,” Gaster says. “I don’t understand.”

It’s not possible for his baby to be dead. He simply cannot wrap his head around that one fact. Every time he tries, his mind recoils desperately from the thought. 

“I’m sorry,” Asgore repeats. He buries his face in his paws, breathing shakily.“I’m so sorry, little one.”

“Shouldn’t I feel it?” he asks. Black dots dance in front of his vision. He forces himself to blink. “If he’s gone. Shouldn’t I feel it? My soul, I mean. It feels the same. It feels like he’s still there. Did you feel it, when Asriel died?”

Asgore is quiet for a long moment. Then, at last, “...yes. I did. It felt as though a piece of my soul had shattered. I suppose it had.”

“I didn’t feel that.” He curls up tighter around the bowl of his child’s dust. “Am I a bad person?”

“What? No, absolutely not. Why would you think that?”

“Because I don’t feel the right way.”

“There is no ‘right way,’” Asgore says. A hand touches his shoulder, and Gaster flinches. The hand is quickly withdrawn. “Everyone grieves differently. You aren’t a bad person because of how you feel. Never think that.”

“Okay.”

Breathe in. Breathe out.

“I shouldn’t have left,” Gaster says.

“No, no, don’t think that.”

“I knew he was worried, and I left him anyway.”

“No, shhh, it’s not your fault. You can’t blame yourself. If anyone’s to blame, it’s—”

“Don’t. You don’t get to blame yourself either.”

Asgore lays down beside him, staring up at the ceiling. “Okay.”

Breathe in. Breathe out.

“I really miss him,” Asgore says, his voice cracking. Gaster knows that if he looks over, there will be tears streaking through the king’s fur. “He was—he was—”

Gaster rolls over and leans his head wearily against Asgore’s shoulder. “I know.”

Asgore weeps, and Gaster lays and breathes through waves of grief.

Breathe in, breathe out.

In the end, he doesn’t eat the soup. Asgore doesn’t have the heart to make him. 

Later that afternoon, Grillby slips into the room and takes a seat on the edge of his bed. The two of them sit in silence together. Gaster likes watching Grillby—the movement of his flames is mesmerizing, and if he focuses hard enough, he can numb out everything but sensation. For the most part, the elemental has returned to his soothing orange color. Every few seconds, however, a blue flame will flicker along his hands or his face. It isn’t the color of savage blue heat—this is darker, smokier. The color of grief.

Gaster pries a hand away from the bowl of dust.  _ Okay? _

Grillby shakes his head.

_ Me neither. _

Breathe in. Breathe out. After a moment, his shoulders begin to shake—terror shatters its way through him in a sudden wave. He’s scared, he realizes. He’s so fucking scared. He can’t accept that Sans is gone, because as soon as he does—as soon as he does, his world will fall to pieces, and he knows he’ll never be able to put them back together the right way. If Sans is—if Sans is—

He squeezes his eyes shut and digs his fingers into the sides of the bowl and shakes and shakes and  _ shakes. _

Someone warm lays down in front of him. Grillby presses his forehead to Gaster’s. “I know,” Grillby whispers—his voice is raspy from disuse, the words slurred clumsily and raw with grief. “I know, Wings.”

They don’t speak any more, after that. They don’t need to. They share their grief in silent spaces and stillness. Gaster cracks his eyes open and stares at the dim flickering of Grillby’s flames, and eventually he manages to choke his brutal terror back into stark, disbelieving numbness. When Grillby leaves, Alphys comes to sit her vigil with him.

“T-there’s a lot of food downstairs, if you’re hungry,” she says, clutching her tail. “Lots of people are—are very sorry.”

He’s heard them coming and going all day. Footsteps and voices and people intruding in his home, his sanctuary, his  _ grief.  _ It makes him prickle with anger, though he knows, logically, that they all mean well. He just wants to be left alone. He just wants to be left. He can barely tolerate the presence of his three closest friends, let alone all the people downstairs. He is an agitated animal, backed into a corner he will never be able to escape from with a wound that will never heal.

“They’ve been bringing casseroles and pies and things all d-day,” Alphys continues, her eyes studying the far wall instead of him. “They send you their condolences.” 

She fumbles to fill the silence for a while longer, before at last relenting to the quiet. When she leaves, Dogamy and Dogaressa take her place. They curl up near the foot of the bed, watching him sadly. Why can’t they leave him alone? Why can’t let him  _ rest?  _ He just wants to  _ rest.  _ When they fall asleep, he sits up. A wave of dizziness washes over him.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

He eats the soup Asgore had left on the bedside table. It’s cold. It’s a means to an end.

With his replenished magic, he steps from his bedroom in Snowdin and into the Core, leaving smothering apologies and unrelenting worry behind. This late at night, the Core is quiet and deserted. Machinery whirrs around him. Magma bubbles and pops below him. He sits down on the edge of the walkway, dangling his legs over the edge. He doesn’t want to die. He just...doesn’t want to live. Not without Sans. Not with this hole in his life, in his soul.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Watching the magma is like watching Grillby. Repetitive. Soothing. Blank.

Breathe in. Breathe out.

He’s lost people before. His parents, his siblings, his friends. The war was not kind to him. The war was not kind to anyone. Somehow, this loss is different. It runs deeper. To have lost something  _ he  _ brought into existence—it’s a new kind of pain. A new kind of guilt. He doesn’t like it at all. 

Breathe in. Breathe out.

He peers briefly into his child’s dust. What will he spread it on? What did Sans love most? Books? A science book or a joke book? Hamburgers? Napping? His friends? His friends. Of everything Sans loved, of course he loved his friends the most. Gaster is sure of it. On the other hand, he doesn’t think Sans’ friends would take well to having dust spread over them.

“Sorry,” he murmurs to the dust. “We’ll have to settle for something different, little one.”

He stays there for a long while, peering into the endless, shimmering expanse of the Core—his only surviving creation. It’s meaningless, now. Everything is meaningless. The world is so dark. The light of the Core beneath him is so useless. 

Breathe. Please, he just has to  _ breathe. _

...he hears footsteps. They’re coming from the direction of the lab. A scientist coming home from a late shift, no doubt. He sighs and prepares to heave himself to his feet. It’s more difficult than it should be, holding the bowl of dust, but like _ hell  _ is he going to set it down for even a second. As it turns out, that’s a detrimental decision. 

His foot slips over the edge of the walkway, and he stumbles. His knee clips the walkway’s edge, slides over. His chin slams into the ground. The bowl drops and cracks. He’s more put-out about than that anything else. “Shit!” he snarls, digging his fingers into the walkway. He’s got one knee braced against the walkway’s edge, and he struggles to get the other leg up over the edge, so he can pull himself back up. “Shit shit shit shit—”

...he could let go. It would be so easy. 

Something inside of him protests the thought vehemently. Something clings to life with fervent determination. He’s not ready to die, not yet. 

Good to know.

“Dr. Gaster!” Boots skids to a stop in front of him. Hands grab his shoulders and haul him forward. He scrambles to dig his shoes into the walkway, pushing himself the rest of the way up before flopping against the ground and sighing. Way too much drama for one night. “Oh my goodness, are you okay?”

He blinks up. Jackson peers down at him, face creased with worry. “Yes,” he says. “I’m fine. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Jeez, you’ve gotta be more careful. It would suck to fall down there. Who knows what would happen?”

Gaster has his theories, but they’re not worth mentioning. “Yeah. Sorry.” He rolls up, onto his knees, and brushes his fingers over the crack in the bowl. No dust has spilled through yet, but he’ll need to be careful on the way home. He’ll should probably teleport again, but...stars, he’s exhausted. 

“Oh, no—is that—?” Jackson’s wings shift in horror. “Is that his dust?”

“Mm.” Gaster carefully stands, picking up the bowl. He presses it close to his chest, careful not to shift it more than he has to. 

“God, I’m sorry. Hey, here—my place is just outside of the Core, we can grab another bowl. I’d hate for you to spill any on the way home.”

Gaster glances up, meets his eyes. The world grows dark, darker, yet darker. “...yes. That’s very kind of you.”

“Hey, it’s the least I can do,” Jackson says, leading him towards the Core’s exit. “I’m—really sorry about what happened, by the way. That seriously sucks. I can’t imagine how it must feel to lose a child.”

“No,” Gaster agrees, peering down at his baby’s dust. “You can’t possibly.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in the next chapter, a dad meets his kid for the first time, so look forward to that! it'll be fun (and terrible!) :D
> 
> aaaand speaking of fun!! here is a fun fact for u: "the giving tree" was one of the stories i chose to have sans tell paps 'cause in the end, the tree lets herself be destroyed to provide for the boy. she'd do anything just to make the boy happy, even if it meant suffering all alone. it reminded me a goodly bit of a pair of skeleton brothers in a game in the distant future, and a goodly bit of a cowardly skeleton who keeps throwing his soul at children he never meant to make u.u


	15. his little brother

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: veeeery unethical experimentation, torture, violence, injuries, child death, body horror, child abuse and neglect**

Gaster follows Jackson into his house, gently setting the bowl of Sans’ dust down on the table. Jackson shuts the door behind them before trotting over to his cabinets, rummaging through them with a nervous sort of energy. “Hmm—let’s see, let’s see—that one’s a bit too small, I think, but that one’s much too big…”

Gaster slumps into one of the kitchen chairs, rubbing his temples. He just wants to go home. Even the most well-intentioned of people are putting him on edge, right now, and Jackson is no exception. (In fact, Jackson seems to be putting him  _ more  _ on edge, for reasons he can’t quite understand.)

“Erm—just a second, Dr. Gaster. I think I might have a better option downstairs. I’ll be right back.” Jackson jogs around the corner, and Gaster hears the click of locks before he vanishes downstairs. Huh. That’s a...lot of locks. He supposes he should be curious, but he’s just...tired. He’s so tired. He slumps over the table, folding his arms and resting his head on them.

Then—then he hears something familiar. The rasp of talon on wooden steps. The drag of a tail. The quiet click of bone as a skeleton moves. His head jerks up in an instant, and he whirls around, his eyes wide. (Some deep, foolish part of him hopes to see Sans standing there, against all odds. That part is sorely disappointed.)

An adolescent blaster stands across from him. Not large enough to be an adult, but far, far larger than any child should be. Colorful wires snake through its spinal canal. Its eyelights gleam red. It lowers it head, looks at him, and then taps its talons on the floor.  _ Tap, tap. _

Disbelief, first. He’s not seeing that, is he? He must be hallucinating. This must be some sort of strange, grief-induced vision his weary soul has decided to abuse him with. What cruelty. It’s so vividly  _ real.  _ He can smell it, stale bone and chemical tarnish. He can hear the subtle clatter of its bones as it shifts. He can see the black hollow between its ribs.

He squeezes his eyes shut.

“Hey, doc,” Jackson says cheerfully. When Gaster opens his eyes again, the blaster remains. Fuck. Fuck, fuck,  _ fuck.  _ “I’d like you to meet my guy 134.”

Horror, next. Black, seething horror at the existence of the creature in front of him. Horror at the very  _ thought _ of this inexperienced fuck picking up a project he deliberately cancelled years ago. Horror at the thought of more blasters, more  _ babies,  _ being born in test tubes and beakers and silent, lonely rooms. Horror at the thought of more soulless children, children alive without love or conscience.

That horror is followed closely by hot, curdling  _ rage.  _

“You,” he hisses, trembling.  _ “You—” _

“Me,” Jackson agrees, beaming and leaning against the blaster’s shoulder. Gaster can’t tear his eyes away from it, and it studies him just as intently. Its tail flicks, and its claws scrape across the floor. “I gotta tell you, man, I’m really proud of this one. It looks a helluva lot more like your blasters than Sans ever did, huh? And you can bet it acts more like one.”

Gaster’s bones begin to rattle. His fury catches and snags on the backs of his ribs, pulling his breath tight and fast. Red spots dance in his vision. He lashes out with his magic, and Jackson’s soul pings blue. Gaster hauls him up and pins him against the far wall. “How dare you. How  _ fucking dare you—” _

“Ah, man.” Jackson winces. “I was hoping you’d make it easy on me. Guess I shouldn’t have expected that, huh? If you’re anything like your blasters, you’re too goddamn  _ stubborn.”  _ He snaps his fingers. The blaster’s eyes flicker to him, and he gestures loosely at Gaster. “134—fight.”

The blaster lunges forward without a second’s hesitation. Gaster flinches back, dropping Jackson, and stumbles into the table behind him. The bowl slides, teeters on the edge. Gaster lunges for it.

_ Crash!  _ Ceramic shatters. Dust spills across the floor, swirls into the air. 

“No!” Gaster shrieks. Even the blaster skids to a stop, snuffling the air in alarm. “No, no no no no! Look what you made me do—” He whirls on Jackson, feels his eyelights flicker out. His little boy’s dust covers his shoes, his jacket, his hands.  _ “Look what you’ve done.” _

Jackson steps backwards, his feathers ruffling anxiously. “Hey, doc, you really don’t want to do this, buddy.”

“You have no idea,” Gaster says, prowling forward, “how  _ fucking much  _ I want to do this. I told you to leave my project alone. I told you to let it lie. And what did you do? You went directly against my orders. You created  _ children  _ for the sole purpose of  _ weaponizing  _ them. You abused my research, my work _ — _ and I trusted you! And what  _ convenience  _ it is that Sans only died after he made me suspicious of you. You had something to do with it, didn’t you? Oh, what a goddamned fool I’ve been.” He bares his teeth. His skull buzzes with fury. “Let me make up for that foolishness now.”

He lunges. Jackson skitters backwards, wings flapping, shouting for 134. Gaster slams a fist into his beak; that shuts him up. As Jackson cries out in pain, clutching his face, Gaster brings a knee up and around, into his flank. A wing strikes him in the side, so he lashes out and yanks ruthlessly at a handful of feathers. They’re sturdier than he thought they’d be, but he still manages to pluck a few. Blood splatters across his hand and Jackson screeches.

Then he hears familiar pawsteps. He hears Sans. He hears his baby bolting across the kitchen with another joke or a plea for snacks. He falters. He turns. He has just enough time to bring his arms up to defend himself. 

The blaster bites.

He designed those jaws to crush bone, and crush bone they do. Teeth bear down on Gaster’s left arm, and he feels his ulna splinter. His shock numbs the pain, however briefly. He tries to tear his arm away, but the blaster has a vice grip. Its eyes, inches away from him, burn like coals. Its snarl vibrates through his bones. He presses his hand to its muzzle, intent on shoving it away, and then—

Then he stops. 

He could fight 134; it wouldn’t be much of a fight, but he could try. He knows a blaster’s weak points better than anyone else. The sternum. The tail. The phalanges. He could hurt this creature. He wouldn’t win, but he could hurt them. If he tried hard enough, he could even hurt Jackson again. That’s what really matters. He’d just...have to get past 134 first. Perhaps, if he was clever enough, he could even escape. He could go and fetch Asgore, the Royal Guard. But—

But it all hinges on fighting 134.

Gaster looks up at them, at fangs and claws and burning eyes. A weapon. His weapon. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly.

It wasn’t much of a choice to begin with.

134 seizes his moment of hesitation and slings its head, throwing Gaster through the air. He slams into the far wall. His breath leaves him in a whoosh, and he hits the ground hard. He scrambles to his feet, but not in time. 134 pounces, pushing him back to the floor. Claws rake down his spine, leaving gouges through the backs of his ribs. Pain breaks through his shock and lashes through him, and he gasps, trying to curl up—to cover his head, his neck, to  _ survive.  _ Enormous jaws close over his skull, and he has just enough time to contemplate his death before they clamp down. (It’s...not a good contemplation, but it’s not terrible, either. At least he’ll get to see his baby boy again.) 

Vicious fangs crack through his skull, and he screams as his vision snaps into darkness. 

…

…

...

…?

...alive? he’s alive…?

Well, shit.

“134,  _ off!”  _ Jackson shouts. The words are a blur, rattling in his skull as he gasps for air. The jaws around his skull vanish, and he hears the patter of pawsteps as 134 lunges away from him. For a moment after that, he hears nothing but heavy breathing. His own breath warps with pain, raspy and quick. He shakes. His teeth chatter. He’s...never hurt this way before. 

Somehow, though, the pain when Jackson touches him—it’s even worse.

“Don’t,” he hisses, his voice ragged. His vision comes back to him slowly, in fragmented bits. “Don’t fucking touch me.”

“Sorry. Don’t speak weird skele-accent,” Jackson says, and he has the nerve to sound genuinely apologetic. He slips his arms beneath Gaster, scooping him up in a single fluid movement that leaves Gaster shuddering with agony. He wants to tear the owl’s eyes out, wants to slit his throat, wants to break every fragile bird-bone, but he finds he hasn’t the strength to. His body shrieks in protest at any movement he makes, no matter how minor. It’s humiliating, to be so weak near such a vile fucking person. 

As soon as he’s able to, he’s going to rip Jackson apart for this. He feels the truth of it like iron in his bones—it’s the strongest part of him, suddenly.

“134, heel,” Jackson says, strolling down the basement stairs with the blaster on his heels. Gaster studies the sound-proofing on the basement walls critically. It’s not just the exterior walls, either—every single wall is covered, keeping the rooms ensconced in silence from even each other. The lights above are bright white. The floors are cold concrete. This work of Jackson’s—it isn’t something rash or small. It’s meticulous. It’s focused.

It’s evil.

Bitterness floods his mouth—and beneath that, the sharp, slick taste of magic. He’s bleeding, somewhere within his skull. He only hopes the wound isn’t fatal. He can’t die yet—he has to escape, first. He has to tell the Guard about what Jackson has been doing here. He has to stop this. He has to make sure his work isn’t used to ruin anything—any _ one _ else.

And unto that point, he will persevere. 

They walk through rooms of incubators, through rooms of cages, through rooms that hold tiny, soulless children, and something twisted and dark and warped begins to make itself at home in Gaster’s soul. Jackson stops in a small, sparse room near the back of the basement. An operating table sits in the center, surrounded by strange, looming equipment. Jackson sets him down on the table, and the cold metal chills him immediately. “You’ll have to give me a moment to get set up,” Jackson says apologetically. 134 takes a seat in the doorway, watching them both warily. “Bringing you here so soon as a bit of an impulsive decision—but you can’t look a gift horse in the mouth, and when I saw you  _ right there—” _

“You’ve been planning this.”

“Well, duh. But I’ll forgo the whole ‘villain monologue’ thing.” Jackson sets a tray down on a cart, lining up his tools. Scalpel. Drill. Forceps. Bone shears. “Work speaks for itself, after all. What’s that they always say? Actions speak louder than words.”

Gaster’s eyes flicker across the room as Jackson fusses over his tools. 134 blocks the only readily available exit. How is Gaster going to get them out of the way without hurting them? “So what’s the plan?” he asks grimly, trying his best to stall while he fumbles for a plan.  _ God,  _ the pain makes it hard to think. “How miserable are you going to make me?”

“I’m not a sadist. I’m going to put you under anesthesia when I can—like now.” Jackson pulls on his lab coat and a pair of nitrile gloves. “I’m going to heal you, and then I’m going to replace your stem cells.”

“You’re going to turn me into one of them.” Gaster’s soul turns in his chest, and he digs his fingers into the table beneath him. Well—digs the fingers of his right hand into the table. The fingers of his left hand won’t respond to him. 

“Oh, doc. You cute little half-breed.” A smile flickers across Jackson’s face. “You’ve always been one of them. The genes have always been right there—we just have to turn them on.”

“A long surgery.” Could he use his blue magic on 134? They don’t have a soul to use magic on, but if he can manipulate their bones like he does objects, then perhaps he can shove them back long enough for him to dart through the doorway. Assuming, you know, that his body is willing to dart anywhere with the injuries it has.

“Very much so.”

“You’ll strip the marrow, I assume. What are you replacing it with?”

“New marrow, new stem cells with a blaster phenotype.”

“If I die?”

“You’re not going to die. I’ve done this before.”

It makes Gaster sick to think of exactly who he’s practiced on. 

“Here. Deep breaths. You aren’t going to want to be awake for this, trust me.” Jackson moves the anesthesia mask towards his face, but Gaster recoils.

“Don’t.”

“You want to be awake?”

He wants to  _ escape.  _ His eyes rake across the room a touch too frantically. Jackson punches him—his knuckles strike right beneath Gaster’s eye, and the already-fragile bone cracks. He shrieks and clutches his face, curling into himself. The movement sends bolts of pain skittering down his spine and his ribs, where 134 had rent him. Agony washes over him like a wave. He feels sick with it. The world spins into darkness again.

Time passes him by. She always does.

When he manages to pry his eyes open, he’s...stuck. His bones have stopped aching quite so badly, and his injuries have been patched together with shoddy magic, but he’s  _ stuck. _ His wrists and ankles have been bound to the operating table. Something hard and cold curls around his neck. Panic flares to life beneath his ribs, overriding even his pain. He yanks against the restraints, and Jackson tsks at him.

“Enough, enough. You’d better hold still—you wouldn’t want me to slip.” He waggles a bonesaw in Gaster’s direction. “And you can’t say I didn’t offer to do this the kind way, sir. You’re the one who turned down the anaesthesia.”

Gaster bares his teeth, because no way in  _ hell  _ is he going to lay here and let this happen. He lashes out with his magic. He lashes out with his magic, and then he arches his back and just about blacks out again because what the  _ fuck.  _ The band around his neck sends a bolt of raw pain through his body and shatters his magic before it can even think about manifesting it into an attack, and he’s left shivering and cold and stunned.

What—the— _ fuck. _

“Nice try. I gotta say, I admire your determination. Hold onto that, okay? It’s what going to get you through this.”

With that, Jackson flicks the bonesaw on, and he begins to carve.

* * *

134 returns to their cage shortly before dawn. Sans bounds over to their side of the cage, dancing his front paws in greeting. The pup doesn’t appear to be hurt or distressed, which soothes Sans’ anxiety almost immediately. He’d be worried about what kind of treatment they got, outside of the cage. 

“Here.” Jackson slides Sans a bowl of meat mash before tossing something small and shiny onto the counter. He’s still dressed in his lab coat. It’s spattered with tiny droplets of red. There’s a patch of still-glimmering white magic on his sleeve. “Breakfast. Enjoy.”

“Where have you been?” Sans asks, pulling his bowl back. “You look like hell.”

“Thanks.”

He doesn’t answer Sans’ question, but Sans has learned not to ask twice. As soon as Jackson has fed them, he takes his leave, and Sans presses his nose to the cage’s side. 

“How was your night, buddy?” he asks, wagging his stump. 134 cracks an eye open. Their tail thumps once. They’ve been getting smaller, and rather quickly. The solution in their concentrator must be running out; that, or Jackson’s lowered the concentration. Their claws are coated in a fine layer of dust. Eugh. Sans hopes that’s not  _ monster  _ dust. “Looks like it was...pretty weird. My night was okay. Kinda boring, but when is it not, right?”

134 sighs at him, curling up and tucking their nose beneath their tail.

“Sleepy, huh?” Sans asks fondly. “Gotcha. I’ll be quiet.”

He curls back up in his corner, staring contemplatively at the wall as 134 sleeps. Jackson doesn’t return until late that evening. On one hand, Sans is grateful, because it means no weird tests or tasks. On the other hand, it’s  _ so boring  _ when he’s not around. There’s only so much pacing and talking to himself a guy can do, you know? 134 is a great pal, but he’s not much of a conversational partner yet. Maybe someday.

“You look slightly better,” he offers as Jackson slides him a bowl of dinner. He pushes his breakfast bowl back out at the same time.

“You think so, huh?” Jackson asks, glancing down at himself. He’s in a clean labcoat, his feathers smoothed. “I guess. Just got done with laundry. Had to clean up my labcoats for tomorrow’s shift.”

“Working two jobs must be hard.”

“Yeah, but you know, it’s worth it. Science never stops.”

“No,” Sans agrees. “I guess not. What are we gonna do tomorrow?”

“Ah—I don’t know that we’ll do anything. I’m gonna be pretty busy. I’ve started an intensive project; it might take me a couple of weeks to finish.”

“Oh.”

“Why? I guess you’re pretty bored, huh?”

“Mmmaybe a little,” Sans says, shrugging. “But it’s okay. I’ll live.”

“No, no, it’s alright—like I said, you’re different than the others. I should have known you’d get bored sooner or later. I’ll bring you some toys or something tomorrow morning.”

Toys? Yeah. Sans can work with that. Anything can be turned into a tool, if he’s just creative enough. “Really? Cool. Thank you.”

“No problem, kid. Have a good night.”

“You too,” Sans says, and quietly imagines biting Jackson’s feathery face off. 

* * *

Gaster had passed out a mere hour into the surgery. It was a small mercy from a world that’s become rather fond of kicking him in the teeth at every opportunity. When he wakes up again, he  _ hurts.  _ Every single bone feels scraped raw and hollow. Each movement sends skitters of agony racing up his spine. Nausea racks him. Everything is hot. He must be boiling. But even all of that—

Even all of that doesn’t compare to the pain of remembering that his baby is dead.

He doesn’t move for a long time.

When he opens his eyes, the world is tinted pink. The blood from his marrow floats around him in thin swirls. He’s suspended in a clear, viscous solution. IOs stake most of his major bones—each femur, each humerus, his pelvis, his spine. When he tries to breathe, the solution bubbles around him. He doesn’t  _ need  _ to breathe, strictly speaking, but deprived of that simple movement—

Deprived of that simple movement, pain and panic are quick to overwhelm him.

He tries to pull one of the IOs out, but they’re far too firmly set, and he’s far too weak. He pushes his hands forward instead—they bump glass. He slams his knuckles against it, to no avail. Not even a crack spreads across the surface. It’s a... tube? He’s in an enormous tube. What irony. This is what he deserves, isn’t it? This is how Sans was birthed. This is how Gaster will die, if doesn’t fight hard enough. Is that justice? He supposes it must be. He’s never thought about an afterlife before, but now—

Now he very much wants to believe in one.

Of course, he can’t imagine laying down and dying while Jackson is still alive, but if he could only see Sans—if he could only see his baby, it wouldn’t be so bad. He wants Sans to be happy, wherever he is. He wants him to be able to run in the sunlight, see the stars, laugh at the world. His baby deserved everything. His baby deserved the universe, and Gaster could never give it to him.

_ Tap, tap. _

He opens his eyes again. Jackson stands in front of him, wings folded neatly, clipboard pressed to his chest. “Morning, Dr. Gaster,” he says. His voice is hollow and warped, through the solution. “How are you feeling?”

Like shit. He doesn’t bother speaking. It doesn’t matter, does it? Nothing really matters, but the—but the children. The baby blasters. He has to stay alive for them. He has to stay alive long enough to free them, if nothing else. If he can just cling to that purpose, then he’ll survive. He has to. It’s his fault they exist. It’s his fault they’re suffering. 

This is his redemption.

He closes his eyes again.

“Not so good, huh?” Jackson asks. “Sorry about that. I’d give you pain meds, but I don’t want them interfering with your metabolism. I’ve got a very delicate balance going on. I don’t want you turning into an over-calcified blob, and I doubt you want that, either.”

Actually, an over-calcified blob sounds pretty good. Nothing can be worse than being Gaster as he is now. Nothing in the world.

Jackson fusses around the tube, around the machines that surround it, before he leaves. Gaster is left to listen to the hum of machinery, the beep of medical equipment, the bubbling of the solution’s filter. He wanted to be alone, didn’t he? Away from his friends, his  _ family.  _ But now that he is—

Now that he is, he feels very, very small and very, very scared.

He’s grateful when sleep comes again.

He lapses in and out of sleep for a long, long time. He can’t say exactly how long. There’s nothing here to tell the time. He only knows that Jackson visits several times, chatting amiably and jotting down notes. Each time he visits, Gaster feels a little bit worse. His bones ache. His joints throb. His magic is a stinging, livid thing within his soul. The collar around his neck begins to feel tighter and tighter.

Soon, he begins to change.

He’s startled out of sleep by an awful throb of pain in his arm. When he looks, there’s a crack running along his radius. He can see new bone building—a wet, shining gleam in the wrong place. The cracks continue to spread. Some of the changes feel like minor, annoying itches. Some of the changes feel like he’s being broken into a thousand pieces, and he screams and screams and screams for it to stop. His old bones snap and warp and dissolve to make way for new constructions. The agony of those changes is unfathomable. 

His soul aches with the unfamiliarity of the form.

Is this what Sans felt, when he changed? It couldn’t have been. He would have never changed, had that been the case. Gaster will never change again, not if he has the choice. This is awful. This is one of the worst things he’s ever endured, he’s sure of it. The only thing worse is recalling the fact that his child is  _ fucking dead.  _

With the physical changes come instinctual changes. He loses the will to speak—not that he had much of that will to begin with. Furthermore, he loses the  _ ability  _ to speak. His hands, warped as they are, can’t sign what he needs them to. With flashes of anger come the urge to bristle his spines, to lash his tail. With flashes of sorrow come the urge to cower and tuck his tail and whimper softly into the silence. He can still sob—and sob he does, when the pain becomes too overwhelming. What does his pride matter, anymore? He  _ hurts.  _

The collar is much too small, now. His bone begins to form around it. 

“I am sorry about the collar,” Jackson tells him, one day. “I knew it would happen, but I just couldn’t risk fitting you with a loose collar earlier on. You were a little too feisty, you know? I’ll cut it out once you’ve finished growing. Don’t worry. You’ll feel better soon.”

Gaster will never, ever feel better.

However, he does realize, one day, as he’s looking out at Jackson, that he feels something new. That something weaves its way into his soul, digs roots in and begins to flourish in the rot it leaves in its wake. It doesn’t take him long to figure out what it is: hatred. Brilliant, vivid hatred. He’s never hated anyone before. Oh, he’s been angry and upset and disappointed, but he’s never  _ hated.  _ He’s never craved  _ hurting  _ someone so very much before. He’s never looked at someone and thought about taking them apart, piece by piece by miserable fucking  _ piece. _

But when he looks at Jackson? _Oh,_ when he looks at Jackson, what terrible things he imagines. What terrible things he fantasizes about. What terrible things he _plans._

He grows in leaps and bounds. His shoulders begin to ache terribly. Some time ago, the tube seemed far, far larger than it needed to be. Now it seems far, far smaller. He’s cramped. He has to hold his head low, clamp his tail between his legs. Is this what a womb is like? He was grown in an artificial womb, years and years ago, and this positon feels familiar. It’s colder, though. Colder, and brighter, and so, so much more painful.

He misses his mother, suddenly. He misses her so much.

What’s more, he misses his  _ friends.  _ Are they looking for him? He bets they are. They’re good friends, and they love him more than he deserves. A part of him hopes they’ll find him. A part of him hopes they don’t, not before this is done. The change has come this far already; he has to finish it. He has to finish it, to turn into the weapon he always wanted, and he has to end Jackson’s life. He has to free his children from this hell.

He sees them, sometimes. His children.

A small blaster with rotting bones is brought to the OR shortly after Gaster’s change begins. They’re placed on the surgery table. A simple shot later, and they’re dust. Jackson sweeps the dust up and throws in into the trash, and Gaster’s chest seethes with wrath. His claws scrape against the glass. He can break it, now, with these claws Jackson has gifted him. He knows he can break it—but not yet. Not yet.

Patience. It’s something his child taught him, and he cherishes that lesson.

Another time, Jackson straps an adolescent blaster to the table. He snaps a portion of its spine open while it lies awake, and it shrieks and cries and doesn’t move an inch. He fusses with the wires embedded in its vertebrae, rearranging them as he wills. When he finishes, he heals the bone and sets the blaster on its feet. The blaster is sobbing. It sounds like Sans.

Gaster shivers with fury. His shoulders burn.

Once, 134 is brought in. They’re even smaller than they were before; how has Jackson done that? How has he manipulated their size? His eyes catch on the black box above their shoulders, and he realizes. 134 glances at him, briefly, cocks their head and then moves on. Jackson straps them to the table and carves their claws into daggers. When he begins to sharpen their teeth, they wail in pain, but they don’t move. They don’t dare move.

Gaster decides then that he’s going to kill Jackson very slowly and very painfully—and, ideally, on that very operating table.

“Just about done,” Jackson announces cheerfully during one visit. “I think we can probably get you out of there in a few days, how’s that sound? You look good, doc. You look a lot like—” He squints. “134. You look a lot like 134. Weird. I thought you’d look more like Sans.”

Gaster loathes the sound of his son’s name on this bastard’s tongue.

“How’s the tail?” Jackson circles around him, and Gaster flicks his tail. There are four strange, long spikes on both sides of the tip of his tail—spikes he’s sure he’s never seen on Sans or his own blasters. He doesn’t much mind them. They’re thin, but they’re sharp. He wonders if he can impale Jackson with them. “Heh. Kind of what I thought they’d look like, little mutt.”

He closes his eyes, unwilling to give Jackson the satisfaction of conversation. He’s in no mood for  _ talk.  _ In fact, he’s feeling quite impatient. When Jackson leaves, he looks himself over. He’s complete, so far as he can tell, although his shoulders and spine still  _ burn. _ Who cares about that, though? Children are suffering. Children are  _ dying,  _ and he needs to get them out. He doesn’t see what good another few days will do him. So, then...why wait?

Tomorrow, he decides. Tomorrow, when Jackson’s away at work, he’s going to tear this hellhole apart.

* * *

Jackson more or less ignores them, for two weeks. He  _ did  _ give Sans toys, like he’d promised—a tug rope, a rubber ball, and a tiny ball with a bell in it. Sans had discovered, to his delight, that the tiny ball could be rolled from his cage all the way to 134’s. Getting 134 to roll the ball back took some teaching, but they’ve made a game of it now. Other than that, though, the toys are useless. He can’t figure out a way to use them to help him escape, despite hours of thought on the subject. He bets Dad could figure it out. Dad can figure out  _ anything.  _

But Dad isn’t here, so that job falls to Sans.

He swats the ball back into 134’s cage. 

134 sighs at him—they’ve been gone most of the day, as they have been almost every day, and they seem tired, despite having almost returned to their regular puppy size. Jackson had taken them out early this morning to work on their teeth and claws, which seem to dull rather quickly with all of their eating and chewing and pacing. 

“C’mon,” Sans coaxes, pushing his rump into the air to playbow at his sibling. “Bop it back. You’ve got this, buddy, you know how to do it.”

134 groans but bops the ball back. Sans pounces on it, cheering enthusiastically.

“Yeah, that’s it! Jeez, you’re so smart. I’ve never met such a smart kid before.” 

134 wags their tail, their eyes brightening some. They heave themself to their feet, playbowing at him. Sans obligingly swats the ball back in their direction. They pounce on it, growling happily, and shake it between their teeth. The bell jingles merrily.

“You’re a tough guy, huh?” Sans says, grinning. “The toughest. That ball ain’t got  _ nothin’  _ on you, champ.”

134 yaps in agreement, dropping the ball to hit it back to him. It bounces off of the bars of Sans’ cage and rolls back into 134’s, and they scowl at it. 

“Hey, c’mon, that’s okay,” Sans says, wagging his stump of a tail a little harder. “Don’t mind. Just try again.”

134 tries again very enthusiastically. They strike the ball with as much force as their tiny paw can muster, and it flies into Sans’ cage, bounces off of the wall, soars into the space in front of their cages, and rolls underneath the counter. Sans groans. 134 flattens themself to the ground when he does, tail curling nervously between their legs.

“Hey, hey, no,” Sans says, trying to keep his voice upbeat. They understand his tone far better than they do his words. “I’m not angry, promise. Who needs that dumb ball anyway?”

...134 needed that ball. It was the only toy Sans could get to them. 

Sans lays down along the edge of his cage closest to 134, sighing softly. He eyes the ball forlornly, and then—blinks, because he swears it’s moving. It rocks gently, then begins to roll towards him. Um. Hello, physics, what? He sits up, squinting, and can make out the faint shimmer of white magic around the ball. Naturally, the next spot he looks at is 134. They’re staring intently at the ball, silent and still with focus.

“Okay, excuse me, since  _ when?”  _ Sans asks. 134 has never used magic—hence, he supposes, why Jackson hadn’t given them a collar. Of course, with the concentrator, they had enough magic  _ to  _ use. Sans just thought they didn’t know how. Maybe they didn’t. Maybe they’ve just figured it out. Sans feels like he should make note of this day in a baby journal or something. He doesn’t remember the first time he himself used magic—he only vaguely remembers the snow, and the cold, and a fire burning between his ribs. Moreover, he remembers the feeling that Magic Is Bad and should only be used in Dire Situations.

Sans thinks this counts.

The ball bumps his paw. “Okay, okay, okay,” he says, wiggling his whole body with excitement. “New game, buddy, new game.”

134 cocks their head, whuffing quietly in curiosity.

Sans scoops the ball up, eyeing the counter. He remembers Jackson had dropped something there a few days ago. He hasn’t stopped thinking about it since, but he had no way to get to it to discover what it was. Now, though—he tosses the ball onto the counter and hears it cling with something metallic. 

“Alright, can you bring the ball back?” Sans asks, dancing his front paws. “Can you get the ball back to me? Please?”

134 scoots up to press against the front of their cage, staring hard at the counter. Sans hears the ball begin to roll slowly—and he hears it push something forward with it.  _ Yes!  _ It topples off of the counter, and with it, a key. Sans’ soul thuds with excitement, and he laughs giddily and bounds in a circle. 134 feeds off of his excitement and runs a lap around their own cage once they finish rolling the ball into Sans’ cage.

“Good job, buddy, really really good job,” Sans says. A key! A  _ key!  _ How lucky can he get? “You’re so awesome—you think you can do it again?”

He tosses the ball back, behind the key. When it rolls forward, it pushes the key along. He has to repeat the process a few times, but eventually the key is close enough for him to reach. He sticks a claw between the bars of his cage and drags it inside, then jumps around in excitement for a moment. 

“Amazing,” he tells 134, wagging his tail so hard his butt sways and he topples himself over, laughing. 134 actually  _ smiles  _ at him, their eyes shining. “Absolutely amazing. You’re so friggin’ cool, dude. Thank you so much. Let’s see what this bad boy can do—”

He tries the key on his own collar, first. No luck. He wants to try it on the lock of his cage, but reaching through the bars to access the lock isn’t possible. He eyes 134 hopefully, but—a movement that complex seems difficult to ask of a puppy who literally learned to use magic a few minutes ago. Well. It can’t hurt to try.

“Okay,” Sans says, showing 134 the key. “I need you to listen for a sec, bud. This goes in  _ there—”  _ He points at the lock outside of the cage. “You turn it, and it might unlock the door. You’ve seen Jackson do it before, right? I need you to do that using your magic.”

134 stares blankly at him.

“Uh—okay. If that’s too hard, I can—”

The key tugs in his hand. He releases it, and it floats out to hover in front of the lock.

“Yes,” he says when 134 looks hopefully at him. “Yes, very good. Now can you put it in the lock and twist it?”

134 fumbles with the key for a few minutes, and Sans keeps up a steady stream of encouragement, because it’s obvious they’re trying as hard as they can to do what he wants. He nearly wheezes with excitement when he hears the key slide into the lock, but it refuses to turn.  _ Damn.  _ He forces his tail to keep wagging, though. There’s no point in making 134 feel bad.

“Awesome, awesome, buddy,” he says instead. “Not that one, that’s okay—can you try yours?” He points at 134’s cage lock. “Try that one.”

134 tries that one. No luck there, either. Sans bites back his frustration as 134 returns the key to him. It has to belong to  _ something.  _ It’s just a matter of figuring out what. He’ll keep it—it’ll come in handy one way or another. He chews his rubber ball open, then shoves the key inside and rolls the ball onto its split side. There. Perfectly normal, unless it gets rolled somehow.

Sans doesn’t want to think about how pissed Jackson will be if he finds out.

For now, though—Sans curls up near 134’s side of the cage. 134 curls up against the side closest to Sans, too, so all that separates them is the empty cage in between. “G’night, buddy,” he murmurs. 134 murmurs something back, and Sans’ head snaps up. “What? Did you just…?”

134 looks sleepily at him.

“Good night?” Sans tries again.

“Ni,” 134 repeats, yawning. Sans’ eyes sting, and his soul feels warm and light. 134’s font only flickered in front of him for the briefest of moments, but he recognizes it nevertheless. It’s a bold font, dramatic and loud. It’s perfect. He laughs, and if it’s a little bit watery, who can blame him? After all, he just found out who his little brother is.

“Yeah,” he whispers, and his grin is just a  _ tad  _ wobbly. “That’s right. Good night, Papyrus.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> y'all order another a blaster?
> 
> ~~fun~~ fact: nobody has eaten at grillby's for the last two weeks, mostly because grillby is Absolutely freaking the fuck out. the king is in despair. alphys hasn't left her lab since gaster went missing. the dogs haven't stopped searching. everyone is having a terrible time.


	16. rot you alive

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: violence, injury, murder, child death, child abuse and neglect**
> 
> ;dlgkja hopefully that's the last chapter we have such awful warnings. welcome to the climax, y'all.

As soon as Jackson leaves for the royal lab the next morning, Gaster opens his eyes and begins his escape. He taps his claws along his glass prison, listening carefully for changes in inflection that might mean weak spots. He finds none, but that’s really not a problem, is it? At this point, he’s certain he can break through even the strongest part of this tube. Jackson clearly wasn’t prepared to house a blaster that  _ wouldn’t  _ roll over and obey his every command in an instant. Still, the owl isn’t a complete fool. Gaster will need to be prepared for the unexpected; there’s simply no way he’s going to waltz out of here without consequence. 

He lifts a talon (how strange, to have talons instead of fingers) and presses the tip to the glass. Tap, tap, tap. He taps steadily at that single point, until a tiny fissure spreads through the glass. He takes his claw away, studies it critically. There’s no need to shatter the glass—a simple crack will quickly cause the glass to buckle outwards, with the pressure of the solution on the inside. He returns to his gentle tapping. 

Before long, solution trickles out of the glass. He lifts a hind leg and braces it against the crack in the glass, then pushes—slow but steady. The glass creaks ominously and begins to buckle. An alarm blares to life above him, flashing red. He ignores it. Within seconds, the glass shatters outwards. Solution floods across the floor, and Gaster yelps and floods out with it. The force of his drop tears several IOs free, and he snarls at the little bursts of pain they cause.  _ Damn,  _ he hurts—but now he has a cause, a purpose, and he can shake it off. He can breathe.

In, out.

Yes, that’s it. That’s just right. 

He doesn’t bother pulling out the remaining IOs—instead, he bites through the tubing as close to the needle as he can get. The needles remain, but he’s freed from the machines, and that’s all he needs, at the moment. He stretches himself out, stumbles. Then he catches a glimpse of his own reflection in the shattered glass around him and grimaces—how grotesque. Reluctantly, he shakes the damp tatters of his clothing off, then peers down at his soul. Dark magic flickers around the edges. He tears his eyes away.

The alarm is louder, now that he’s freed from the solution. It’s really starting to piss him off. He spots the speaker embedded in the ceiling a few feet above him, then rears up on his hind legs and tears it out in a massacre of metal and wires. Blissful silence descends. He shakes himself off, spattering solution across the room. Dried marrow sticks to his bones, and he chews at one particularly itchy spot of red crust before his sense of urgency drives him forward. 

The door to the OR is made of thick, heavy steel, and it’s locked shut. There’s no way he can get through it without his magic; it’s a good thing he’s older and a good deal more educated than the blasters Jackson had originally intended on housing here. Instead of flinging himself uselessly against the door, he limps to one of the computers. (His left foreleg throbs with each step—whatever Jackson healed, he didn’t heal  _ right.) _ The most difficult part of hacking the door locks is getting his stupid, enormous claws to work on the mouse and keyboard. Jackson’s coding is laughably simple; he’s spent far too much time on biology and far too little time with technology. Gaster’s tail twitches with satisfaction as he presses one final button.  _ Click. _

Doors whoosh open all over the lab.

His first stop is the room of small cages. As per usual, most of them are empty, but three are full. He crouches in front of them, and an instinctive chirr rises in his throat when he sees the pups barricaded within. Two of the tiny blasters jerk awake, bristling their spines and backing away from him. He chirrs softly at them again; a sound of comfort, of nurturing. One of them relaxes. The other spits furiously at him, arching their back. He reaches forward and hooks a claw through the bars of their cages, pulling the doors off of their hinges like it’s the easiest thing in the world.

You know, he could really get used to a form like this.

He scoops one of the blasters up in his mouth. They squeal and squirm, their claws grating against his teeth and chin, but he ignores them and pads out of the room to drop them off at the top of the basement stairs. He stops as soon as he enters the next room, however, because there, sitting at the base of the stairs, is 134. Its tail curls neatly around its paws, and it lifts its head when it sees him. A low growl rattles in its chest; it’s larger than it was before—the same size as Gaster himself is now, if not even bigger.

Shit.

How clever of Jackson, leaving 134 to guard him. He’d seen Gaster’s weakness, no doubt, seen how he’d shied away from fighting his own creation; it must have been the most natural thing in the world to use that weakness. Even now, Gaster feels that weakness in his bones. He sets the blaster in his jaws down, and it stumbles at his feet. He lowers his head, closes his eyes for a brief moment. “Please,” he rasps to 134. “I don’t want to fight you.” 

Not again—because this time, he can’t afford to lose.

134 doesn’t respond—and why would it? Gaster doesn’t speak its language. Instead, 134 stands, its tail swaying behind it. It clacks its teeth together, fanning its spines before lowering its own head. It snakes its neck, and some primitive hollow in the back of Gaster’s mind understands exactly what that means:  _ move back, go where I tell you.  _

Gaster refuses. He digs his claws into the concrete and takes a deep breath. In, out. “I want to help,” he says, “but you have to let me. I—”

134 lunges forward, snarling. Gaster rears onto his hind paws, bashing his head against the ceiling (fucking  _ ow)  _ before diving down again. He slams his front paws down against 134’s shoulders, and it twists its head around and digs its teeth into his elbow. He shoves it down, and its chest crashes into the ground. It writhes beneath him, its eyes blazing red. A second later, it releases his elbow and snakes its head up to lock its jaws around his spine, just behind his ribs. It begins to bear down, and Gaster’s hindquarters spasm with pain. Shit—if 134 breaks his spine, he’s done for. He may not die, but he sure as fuck won’t be able to move or fight. He won’t be able to help his children escape. 

He’ll be damned if he’s going to accept that.

Hissing, Gaster surges his head down, jaws wide. He sees a flicker of black in his vision—a flicker of poisonously familiar black—and he knows exactly what he needs to do. He fits his teeth around the back of 134’s neck, and he  _ bites.  _ 134 squalls in surprise, its hind legs scrabbling against the concrete. Gaster uses his weight to press 134’s head to the ground as soon as it releases his spine, and he sets a front paw on its muzzle to keep its jaws pressed shut. For all its immense size, it’s still only a child, and it has no  _ idea  _ what it’s doing. 

Something splinters beneath Gaster’s jaws, and 134 screams.

Gaster pulls back, thick magic and scalding red DT dripping from his teeth. He slings his head, splattering the goop across the walls. The concentrator screwed into 134’s bones is shattered, oozing a grotesque mixture of chemicals across its vertebrae and scapula. Beneath him, he feels 134 begin to change—its bones warp and shrink, and it shrieks and claws its skull and writhes. Its agony is unbearable to watch. Gaster shrinks away, crouching so that his sternum touches the ground. He dares not touch 134; he doubts that would be a comfort to it, anyhow.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, instead. His eyes sting. His chest feels carved out and hollow. “I’m sorry, little one. Everything will be over soon, and you’ll be safe, I promise. Nothing will hurt you after this.” His voice chokes, and he sees Sans in front of him. He is so tired of seeing his children hurt. “I won’t let anyone hurt you again.”

He’ll protect them all the way he failed to protect Sans.

When 134’s change stops, it lays panting in front of him—stars, but it’s small. It’s only slightly larger than Sans was, when he was a year old. It’s just a goddamn  _ baby.  _ And even so, it staggers onto its feet as soon as it can. Tears drip from its cheeks, and it shudders from head to tail with pain, but it bares it teeth and takes a step towards him. Disbelief settles in Gaster’s chest. All of that? All of that, and it  _ still  _ wants to fight?

...what Gaster wouldn’t do to snap Jackson’s neck between his teeth.

He scoops up the blaster pup at his paws and leaps over 134, racing up the stairs. 134 snarls in protest, but he ignores it. He has children to save, and he doubts 134 is going to sit still and let him. He weaves his way around it (it’s certainly an ankle-biter) as he grabs the other pups from the far room, depositing them at the top of the stairs. He’ll be back for them in a moment—just as soon as he clears the other rooms. He won’t be able to move the incubators; he’ll have to fetch the Royal Guard before he tries that—but if there are any other children here, he needs to get them out as soon as possible.

He bounds farther into the lab. 134 races after him, shrieking in offense.

For several minutes, he stalks through the rooms, looking intently for any other blasters he can free now. The lab isn’t large, and he quickly stumbles into the last room. This one is far larger than the others—cages stretch from floor to ceiling. Clearly, these were meant to house adult blasters, but Gaster doesn’t see any adult blasters. He only sees a single puppy, and it’s—

Gaster stops. His thoughts grate to a halt.

This puppy isn’t an infant, but he’s certainly not an adult. No—he’s—he’s five. He’s only five. He’s still wearing his blue hoodie; it’s filthy, now, but intact. He looks unharmed. He looks...alive. 

Impossible. That’s impossible. 

Gaster staggers a step forward, blinking hard, waiting for the vision to dissipate and break his heart all over again, waiting for it to leave him gasping and shattered and alone. It doesn’t. Sans stands there and looks back at him and doesn’t disappear. 

With a pained cry, Gaster surges forward and slams himself into the bars of Sans’ cage.

* * *

Sans had been having a pretty chill morning, until the giant crazy blaster flung itself into his life. He scrambles backwards when the blaster slams into his cage, his soul pounding and his eyes wide. Okay. Okay, crazy giant blaster wants to eat him. Noted. He tucks himself into the far corner of his cage, breathing fast and trying to make himself small and unassuming. The blaster snarls, locking its fangs around his cage’s bars and surging backwards. The metal creaks and strains between its jaws, but the metal was made to withstand an adult’s bite, and it doesn’t break.

“What do you want?” Sans demands as the blaster gnashes its teeth furiously on the bars of his cage. “Stop. Uh—down. Off. Leave it.”

The blaster turns one enormous, burning eye on him and snarls. It releases his cage, pacing furiously in front of him, its tail lashing. Now that Sans can see the full length of its body, the shape of its skull, it actually looks...sort of...familiar…It’s crying. Gray tears stream down its face, and its chest heaves in stuttering gasps. Sans’ soul wrenches. Why is it crying? Why is it…?

“Hey. Hey, um.” He steps forward, hesitates. The blaster’s gaze snaps to him. Tears pool along the rims of his eyesockets. “It’s okay. You don’t have to be upset.”

God. Shit. It looks a lot like Papyrus—it could almost pass for his twin. They have the same long, lean build; the same sharp spines and wicked fangs; the same slanted eyes and pointy muzzles. Their differences are slight; this blaster has a wider chest and broader shoulders. There are strange divots in its scapula, and odd spikes along the tip of its tail. Still, despite how strange it looks, there’s something unnervingly familiar about the way it holds itself, about the soft, nervous gleam in its eyes.

Sans takes another tentative step forward. 

Papyrus bursts into the room, shrieking furiously. Horrified, Sans watches as he throws himself at the enormous blaster, sinking his teeth into its hind paw. He expects the blaster to whirl around and punt Papyrus across the room like a tiny football, but instead it sighs and doesn’t move an inch. Papyrus whines anxiously. 

“Okay. Okay, right, it’s—it’s okay,” Sans says, holding his hands up, palms out. He certainly doesn’t want to startle the blaster into hurting Papyrus. “We’re all okay. Nobody needs to freak out. Papyrus, that means you, too.”

The blaster crouches in front of his cage. It presses its nose to the bars, its breath hitching. It squeezes its eyes shut. Its bones tremble. Sans cautiously crosses the rest of the cage and leans forward, touching the tip of his nose to the adult’s. It smells like stale bone and solution and misery. It smells...familiar. Sympathy twists in his chest.

“Hey, it’s alright.” He closes his own eyes. “You don’t have to be sad. Jackson isn’t here right now, so we’re safe. We’re—”

“Sans,” the blaster rasps, its voice choked, and Sans’ eyes snap open. That font. That accent. He knows them. He’s heard them every day, ever since he was created. It’s as much a part of him as his own font.  _ Wingdings.  _

He staggers backwards and the blaster’s eyes snap open, an agitated whine in its throat.

“What?” he asks, stunned.  _ “What?” _

“Sans,” the blaster repeats. It laughs, tears dripping off of its jaw and splattering on the ground. “My baby. My little one. You’re okay, you’re here, you’re  _ okay.” _

“D-dad?”

“Yes.” The blaster chirrs, its tail wagging. “It’s me. Dad’s here now, Sans. I’m going to get you out, don’t worry.”

“Dad.” His eyes sting with tears, and he pushes his head against his father’s muzzle. A sob aches in his chest, but he swallows it. Not yet. Not now. “I thought—I thought you couldn’t find me. Jackson said he told you I was dead. I thought you weren’t coming, I thought you were still at home, I thought—”

“Shhh,” Dad croons gently. “I found you. I’m here now, and I’m going to keep you safe.”

He hooks his claws through the bars, trying to get closer to his father. “I can’t get out. I found a key, but I don’t know what it goes to. I already tried it on our collars and cages.”

“Show me, please. We have to hurry.”

Sans rushes back to get the key, prying it out of his rubber ball and showing it to Dad. Dad surveys it with a critical eye. “Do you know what it goes to?” Sans asks.

“I’ve no idea,” Dad says. “But here—try it on this.”

Dad lays his head flat on the ground, turning so Sans can see the side of his neck. There’s a warp in the bone there—a lump near the side, and a thick metal band running across the top. A collar, he realizes. There’s a collar embedded in Dad’s vertebrae. The tears in his eyes finally spill down his cheeks, and his breath hitches on a sob.

“What’d he do to you?” he asks.  _ “What’d he do that for?” _

“I’ll explain later, just as you’ll have to explain to me what happened to your tail. But focus, now, my little one. We’ll have time for that later. Can you see the lock?”

Sans rears up onto his hind legs to see the top of Dad’s neck. The thickest part of the collar rests on top—hence, he supposes, why Dad’s bone hadn’t completely covered it. It’s the battery box, he realizes. There’s a keyhole near the side. He won’t be able to get Dad’s collar off (especially not with the way it’s grown in) but maybe, if he can break the circuit it creates, he can deactivate it. 

“Okay, there’s a lock there.”

“Can you reach it with the key?”

“No. My paws won’t fit through the holes—but Papyrus can use his magic to do it.”

“Papyrus?”

“Yeah.” Sans wags his tail, pointing at Papyrus, who growls furiously when Dad looks at him, biting Dad just a  _ little  _ bit harder. “Papyrus. He’s my little brother!”

“134,” Dad says.

“No.” Sans scowls. “Papyrus.”

“Papyrus,” Dad amends. “Well, if you could get Papyrus to stop fighting me, that would be a fantastic start.”

“Right, uh—Paps, hey, c’mere,” Sans calls, dancing his front paws. Papyrus offers him a scathing look. “Come here, buddy. Off.”

Papyrus unlatches his teeth, shooting Dad one last glower before slinking in Sans’ direction.

“Good job,” Sans presses his muzzle to the bars of the cage, and Papyrus sniffs warily at him. “Thanks, Paps.”

“Can you ask him to unlock the box?”

Sans quickly conveys what they want to Papyrus, who grudgingly obliges when Sans forces his tone into something resembling cheerful. The key settles into the lock, turns, and... _ click.  _

“Yes!” Sans cheers, bouncing in a circle. “You’re so cool, Papyrus,  _ oh my god.” _

Papyrus huffs.

“Can you shake the batteries out?” he asks Dad, who stands and gives himself a full-bodied rattle. When that doesn’t work, he sticks his head under the counter and pushes up, rubbing the back of his collar along the underside of the counter until the batteries pop loose. One last shake and they fall free, scattering along the floor. “Now you can blast us outta here!”

“Little one, you know better than that,” Dad chides, amused. The tumblers in Sans’ lock begin to shift and rearrange as Dad manipulates them with gravity. “Brute force seldom accomplishes what you want. It’s all about tactic.”

The lock clicks. Sans’ cage door swings open. With a shriek of joy, he plunges out and into his dad’s arms. Dad hugs him as best he can, in this awkward form, and Sans does his damned best to crawl up and into his father’s ribcage. His soul glows warm and familiar (albeit strangely...dark, at the edges), and Sans is so happy he could cry. Dad squeezes him tightly, nuzzling across his skull and chirping giddily.

“I missed you,” Sans whispers, rubbing his cheek against Dad’s chest. “I missed you so much.”

“I missed you too, little one,” Dad says, touching his nose to Sans’ skull. “More than you could possibly know.”

For a moment, the two of them simply embrace each other—but eventually, time gets the best of them. The urgency of their situation is never far way.

“We need to go,” Dad says, reluctantly.

“I know.” Sans squirms out of his arms. “Alright, Papyrus—Paps?”

Papyrus has slipped underneath the counter, eyeing them both uncertainly. Sans steps in after him. He keeps his movements slow, his tail wagging as best it can. When he reaches his little brother, he leans down and touches their noses. Papyrus flinches back, then pauses, his teeth clicking as he thinks. After a moment, he leans up and bumps his nose against Sans’ again, and Sans grins. “There we go,” he says. “We’re buddies, remember? Brothers. I’d never hurt you. C’mon—Dad’s gonna take us somewhere safe.”

He reaches around and fits his teeth around Papyrus’ neck, just above his shoulders (the concentrator is broken, and he gets a feeling he knows who to thank for that) before scooping him up. The pup instinctively curls himself, his tail between his legs, and goes limp. He’s small enough that Sans has no trouble carrying him.

“Do you want me to take him?” Dad asks, peering down at him. Stars, but his father is massive when he’s a blaster.

“Nuh-uh,” Sans says. “I got him. I don’t want him to be scared.”

“I’m that scary, am I?” Dad teases.

Sans rolls his eyes. “No, but he doesn’t know you, silly. C’mon.”

The two of them pad out of the room and back into the hallway. Sans’ gaze immediately snaps to the room of small cages. “What about them?” he asks.

“I already took them upstairs,” Dad says. “I’ll grab them on our way out. We’re going to Asgore’s right away; the Royal Guard will help us catch Jackson, and then we can come back for the incubators.”

The two of them trot farther down the hall, but when they reach the room before the stairs, Dad skids to a stop. Sans stumbles to a stop behind him, Papyrus swinging in his grip. “What is it?” he asks, peering around Dad’s legs. “What’s—oh, shit.”

The incubators have been turned over, their glass smashed in and solution pooling like blood on the floor around them. Sans immediately bolts towards the room of small cages.

“Sans, wait—!”

The cages are empty, as Dad had promised. The incubators here have been turned over, too. Several—several—

Several tiny fetuses lay sprawled on the floor, eyes closed and bodies limp. Not old enough to survive out of solution, but old enough to—to think and feel and breathe. Old enough to die scared and cold and alone. A shudder of horror runs from Sans’ snout to his tail-tip. Papyrus squirms and whines in his grip. Dad’s shadow falls across them, and a subsonic growl rolls through the room.

“That bastard,” Dad hisses.

“He killed them,” Sans says, numb. 

“Yes. Which means we have to go, right now, because he’s back.” Teeth fit around Sans’ neck, and he curls up tightly around Papyrus as Dad scoops him up and carries him back towards the stairs. The basement door is shut, but it isn’t locked, and Dad pushes his way into the house. The spines on his back scrape the ceiling. He looks desperately around the hall, then moves into the kitchen. There’s dust all over the floor.

Jackson leans against the far counter, a tiny blaster pup in his hands.

“You’ve been busy, huh, doc?” he asks, hooking his fingers beneath the blaster’s chin. It squirms, whimpering softly, and Dad bristles. His spines slice through the ceiling. “Well, so have I. This is the only one of your kids left—well, besides those two you’ve got right there. I mean, look at this cute little thing.” He rubs his cheek against the pup’s. “I bet you want it too, huh? Tell you what, I’ll let it live, if you be a good boy and put Sans and 134 back in their cages.”

Dad slowly lowers Sans to the ground, letting him get his feet back under him before releasing him. “Watch your brother,” he rumbles softly, nosing Sans into the living room. Sans stumbles forward, carrying Papyrus with him. He sets him down a few feet back, crouching protectively over him. 

“So,” Jackson says, “I’ll take that as a no?”

He tightens his grip on the pup’s chin, then twists its head sharply up and to the side. The vertebrae of its neck snap, and the pup’s eyelights vanish almost immediately. Dad staggers a step forward, his eyes wide. Whatever he had been expecting, it wasn’t a death that quick. Then, just as quickly, his own eyelights flicker out. He lowers his head, lashes his tail hard enough to leave gashes in the walls. 

Jackson’s soul flickers blue. 

* * *

Gaster has never felt this angry before. Then again, he supposes he’s never faced down a genocidal maniac who’s single-handedly created and killed hundreds of his children before, either. His rage is really  _ peaking _ right about now. He wants nothing more than to pin Jackson down and rip his fucking guts out—so that’s exactly what he aims to do.

He lashes out with his magic, and Jackson’s eyes widen. Hadn’t been expecting him to be able to do that, had he? Had expected Gaster’s collar to still be functional,  _ hadn’t he?  _ Gaster snarls and slams Jackson into the wall, then up and into the ceiling before letting him drop back to the ground. He yanks up several walls of bones—one in front of the door, another in front of the windows, and one last in front of the living room, to keep Jackson from getting  _ anywhere  _ near his babies.

Jackson groans, picking himself up and bracing against a counter. Blood trails from his nose. “Jeez,” he says. “Don’t start off easy or anything.”

Gaster’s soul flickers purple, and he searches quickly for the planes of space he’s still allowed movement in. He prowls forward, rattling his bones, feeling out the spots his soul sticks and the spots he can move freely. Jackson stumbles backwards, away from him. His wings hit the wall of bones in front of the door, and he reaches to the side, pulling his shotgun between two of the bones. 

“Right,” he says. “My turn now.”

He fires, and Gaster immediately hauls up another layer of bones in front of the living room, lacing them together to create a thick wall without a single damnable gap. Like  _ hell  _ is he letting a single pellet through to his children. The pellets spatter him, instead, lodging themselves into the bones of his skull and shoulder. He hisses, swinging his head. Hot, hot, hot. He doesn’t like that at all, but it won’t kill him. It’s awfully hard to kill a skeleton—unless you snap their neck like a  _ fucking bastard. _

Gaster summons a row of bones and flings them in Jackson’s direction. The owl springs over them, dodges between them, and then lifts his shotgun and fires again. This time Gaster springs into the second plane he’s allowed movement in—a sliver of space a few feet to the side of the one directly in front of Jackson. What he really needs is time to charge a blast, but he doubts Jackson’s going to let him have that time very easily. 

So, instead, he summons two blaster heads. They hover behind him, charging their blasts, and he focuses on dodging Jackson’s shots. They come more quickly, more desperately, when Jackson notices the blasters. The moment one blaster opens its mouth to fire, he lunges out of the way. The front door bursts open in a spray of shattered wood. The second blaster reaims and fires again, and Gaster hears Jackson scream. 

“You fucker,” Jackson hisses as the smoke clears, his eyes blazing. One of his wings is singed, sticky with bright red blood. “I’ll kill you, and your little brats, too. I’ll make them  _ suffer.” _

Like he hasn’t already done that.

Gaster picks Jackson up by his soul and flings him outside. He hears shouts of alarm down the street, monsters flocking to the scene. Good. The Guard should be here soon. He bounds forward, baring his teeth. Once he’s outside of the constraints of the house, he draws himself to his full height, his eyes blazing. He sees monsters skid to a stop out of the corner of his eye. They look on him with fear, and he doesn’t blame them.

(In the back of his mind, he feels something hit a wall of bones he’s created—the one in front of the living room. Sans is trying to get out, no doubt. Gaster redoubles his efforts to keep the wall up.) 

Jackson yanks his shotgun back up—this time, he aims it down the street. Gaster’s eyes widen, and he lunges to take the shot against his shoulder. Better him than civilians. Better him than anyone else in the world. He earned this, didn’t he? If he’d never started this damn project to begin with, none of this would have happened!

...but he wouldn’t have Sans, either.

He lashes out with a forepaw, knocking Jackson back down the street. Jackson’s purple magic hauls him forward, refusing to allow him any distance between himself and his enemy—not that he wants any. Oh, no. Far from it. 

“Someone get the king!” a monster shouts. “Call the Guard!”

Oh, yes. Call the Guard. Let them see this fucker for who he really is, the way Gaster failed to do  _ so many times.  _ Behind him he hears glass shatter. He hears tiny pawsteps on the ground, loping towards him. He hears Sans shout. “Dad!  _ Dad!” _

Jackson lifts the shotgun, aims underneath Gaster’s chest. Aims at Sans.

Gaster opens his mouth and lunges forward, intent on biting Jackson’s face clean off for that damnable threat. The gunshot rings in his ears. The roof of his mouth boils, and he rears back, shrieking in pain and pawing desperately at his muzzle. That bastard.  _ That bastard.  _ He surges forward before Jackson can cock the gun again, slamming a paw into his chest and flattening him to the ground. He pries his jaws open, despite the burn in his mouth, and crushes the gun’s barrel between his teeth before yanking it out of Jackson’s hands and flinging it aside.

He hears Sans skid to a stop behind him, breathing hard. “Dad…?”

He can’t stop growling. There is so much fury in his chest. It’s going to kill him. He feels it begin to build, snapping and sparking with his magic, burning hot along his ribs, his spine. All he has to do is open his mouth. If he only does that, his anger will abate. Justice will soothe the ache between his ribs. Jackson doesn’t deserve to  _ live,  _ not after what he’s done, not after he slaughtered so many  _ children, _ not after he abused Gaster’s work and family. Death would be a mercy, and Gaster would gladly offer it to him. 

But.

But his sons are watching.

He trembles with indecision. If he kills Jackson, will his anger stop? Will it mean anything at all? Killing Jackson won’t bring his children back. It won’t erase their pain, their suffering. It won’t give any meaning to this hell of a situation. But perhaps—

Perhaps it would dissuade another person from doing the same.

(And it would certainly make Gaster feel better.)

He digs his claws into Jackson’s chest, listens to him struggle to breathe with a disproportionate amount of pleasure.

Sans leans against his hind leg. “The Guard’s here. They can take him.”

Would they ever truly be safe, if he let Jackson live? Would they ever  _ feel  _ safe? Would he? Could he ever be truly content, knowing he’d let a genocidal  _ child-killer  _ live even a day longer than he had to? Isn’t doing nothing the same as committing the crime yourself? 

...on the other hand.

On the other hand, if he kills this man, what will his sons grow up believing? Haven’t they been traumatized enough? If they watch their father slaughter another monster in front of them, what will they learn? He’s won. He knows he’s won. If Jackson  _ does  _ deserve to be killed, that’s a Judge’s decision to make. 

(But  _ oh,  _ the  _ right _ to kill him—that belongs to Gaster and Gaster alone, and it is a right he fully intends to claim.)

The magic in his chest burns hotter. He’s going to choke on it.

He opens his mouth. Magic surges forward, crackling and spitting light, and his blast slams into the ground. It leaves a smoking, blackened area next to Jackson’s head. The owl trembles beneath him, eyes wide and terrified.

“I will make your death,” he hisses, lowering his voice so Sans won’t hear him (because Sans is the only one who can understand, the only one who’s  _ ever understood), _ “a slow and painful process. You will wish I had killed you here today. You will beg me to end your life before I’m done, and I will  _ rot _ you alive. Do not mistake this mercy for forgiveness.” A cracked grin spreads across his face. “Be seeing you, Jackson.”

He steps away. Sans stares up at him, eyes wide, as the Guard surges forward. 

“His muzzle!” a guard shouts. “Quick, someone get a muzzle—”

A chain lasso is thrown around his muzzle, pulled until it digs into his bone. His head is yanked down, and he snarls and digs his claws into the dust. Spears push threateningly against his sternum, driving him to step away from Jackson. Crossbows level with his ribs—with his soul. 

“Stop—stop, wait, what are you doing—?” Sans stumbles backwards, his eyes wide. “Let him go! He was saving us, he’s hurt,  _ let go—” _

“Sans?” One of the guards freezes, looking down at him. Another swarm of guards falls upon Jackson, tying his hands behind his back and pulling him away from Gaster. “Gaster’s boy? You’re Gaster’s missing boy, aren’t you?”

“Yes! I’m Sans, and that’s my dad, that’s Dr. Gaster. Let him up,” Sans demands, digging his tiny teeth into the chain around Gaster’s muzzle and pulling. The chain shifts only minisculely. Gaster is...so tired, suddenly. He is so tired and so angry. A part of him wants nothing more than to open his jaws and tear the guards apart for putting their filthy fucking hands on him. He wants to hurt them. He wants to hurt someone. Anyone.

He’s never felt that way before. It terrifies him.

“Sans?” A broken voice. A familiar voice. Gaster’s eyes jerk to the side—Asgore. The king is dressed in his black battle armor, his trident at the ready, but he has never looked weaker. His hands tremble, and he drops to his knees. “Sans, little one—is it really you?”

“Asgore!” Sans bounds towards him, burying himself in the king’s arms. “Asgore, make them let go! He’s hurt, he needs to see a healer, please,  _ please—” _

“Oh, hush, hush, my dear” Asgore says, squeezing Sans to himself. “What do you mean? Who is this?”

“It’s Dad,” Sans says, his claws scraping desperately across Asgore’s breastplate. “Jackson made him change, but it’s Dad, and they’re hurting him, please you have to let him go—”

Asgore’s expression morphs from one of great relief to one of great horror. Gaster closes his eyes so he doesn’t have to bear it. “Release the blaster,” Asgore commands. “At once.”

The chains around his muzzle slacken. The spears retreat, the crossbows drop. His anger does not abate. He hears Asgore’s boots crunch against the ground as the king nears him. A soft paw settles on his muzzle, and he fights the urge to snap his teeth at it.

“Wingdings?” Asgore whispers. “Is it you?”

He opens one eye to regard the king wearily. Words are too far from him. If he opens his mouth, he fears what will come out.

“Oh, Wingdings. Oh, my little one.” The king drops to his knees again, pulling Gaster’s muzzle into his lap. “We thought we lost you, too. I’m so glad you’re alive.” He leans his head down, rests his forehead against Gaster’s. “We’ll get you a healer at once—the best healer in the kingdom. Can you walk? Can you come with me?”

Gaster’s physical wounds are the least of his worries. He dare not follow Asgore into any town; he can’t stay here any longer, or he’ll ruin something that can’t be repaired. Exhausted, he heaves himself onto his feet and sways in place. In the absence of adrenaline, he feels every ache and every sting. There are far too many to count. 

“Dad?” Sans whispers. He glances down. Sans stares up, into his ribcage, with an expression of terror. “What’s wrong?”

Gaster glances back, then startles. The edge of his soul curls, warped and sticky and black. Even as he watches, a splatter of black liquid falls from it and drops onto one of his ribs. It sticks there like tar. His HP ticks down. 

“Oh, no,” Asgore whispers. “No, no no no no. We have to go. We have to get to a healer at once—”

No. Gaster knows what he has to do.

He glances around the street, searching frantically, then looks at Sans—his boy reads him almost instantly, thank the stars.

“He’s okay,” Sans says. “He’s still in the living room. I’ll go get him, just go with Asg—”

Gaster lurches forward, bounding through the crowd of monsters and back into the house. Papyrus is curled up behind the couch, and Gaster tears the furniture up and flings it back into the kitchen with one heavy paw. He surges down, grabbing Papyrus’ neck and shoulders with his teeth, then bolts back into the street. Papyrus curls up on instinct, but Gaster can feel him trembling. 

He sets a course for his lab, and he runs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun(?) fact: hp is a super malleable thing in this 'verse! it's easily transferred between parents and children through soulmagic, but this transfer is generally seen as irreversible (because if a parent took enough of their hp back, it would kill their child, and most parents aren't fond of killing their children). whereas a parent is technically capable of taking soulmagic/hp back, a child usually can't _give_ it back. (mostly a survival function, bc toddlers who learned how to give hp up usually died pretty quickly). hp lost from physical damage is repaired when the physical damage is (usually through magic food or healing magic). hp lost because of emotional damage is...trickier. it can be regained, too, but not nearly as easily or quickly. that's why, if monsters lose too much hp from grief/anger/trauma, they can fall down. needless to say, gaster's been losing hp for a while.


	17. the hours before death (family heirloom)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: child abandonment, surgery, Terrible Coping Mechanisms, a lot of discussion about death and dying, references to abuse, blood, injury, a smidgen of violence**
> 
> edit 12-17-19  
> arT I FORGOT TO LINK TO THE INCREDIBLE ART ALGERNON HAS NOW!!! [here](https://rat-kibble.tumblr.com/post/189471658651/ive-been-hoarding-these-algernon-doodles-for-a) is some phenomenal art of jackson, gaster, and some justifiably angry blasters by @rat-kibble on tumblr! [ here's](https://zuzu-rebloop.tumblr.com/post/189439086671/parsnipit-this-is-how-i-imagine-jackson) a great reference of jackson, [ here's](https://zuzu-rebloop.tumblr.com/post/189443635531/i-cant-believe-i-gave-this-man-a-design-and-now-i) jackson being an ominous douchebag, and[ here](https://zuzu-rebloop.tumblr.com/post/189459010066/im-fucking-terrified-parsnipit) is the horror that is jackson without feathers, all by @zuzu-rebloop on tumblr!

Gaster slams through the lab doors, panting, his pup swinging from his jaws. Charlie glances up from the receptionist log, then does a double-take.

“I’m going to go out on a limb and assume you’re not supposed to be here,” he says, adjusting his glasses. “So if you could kindly turn around and—”

Gaster sets Papyrus down, crouches, and blasts the locked doors open. Charlie gapes. He scoops Papyrus up again, lunging forward and swerving into the stairwell. There’s no time to waste—he moves as quickly as he can, scattering scientists and papers in equal measure. As soon as he reaches the operating room, he dives into it. He slams the door behind him and locks it with a flick of magic; he has no time for questions and crowds right now. 

The machines are still programmed with his specifications. That will have to do; it’s fortunate that Papyrus isn’t much bigger than Sans was, when Gaster did this for him. He sets the pup down on the surgery table, flicking the anesthesia on before wedging the mask onto Papyrus’ muzzle. He wishes, oh, he _wishes_ he had time to be gentler, but he doesn’t, not with his soul rotting away between his ribs. It won’t be long before it’s completely ruined, before _Gaster_ is completely ruined.

Papyrus needs a soul, and he needs it now, before Gaster has nothing good left to give.

But Gaster’s stupid, awful, _big_ claws don’t make things any easier. He doesn’t want to waste more magic than he has to (not when he’s already losing it so quickly), so he fumbles to smear disinfectant across Papyrus’ sternum using his paws. He doesn’t bother disinfecting his metacarpals; what is this injury, compared to the others scattered across his worthless body? It is the best injury of them all. He sets his paw down on the laser cutter—too big, it’s too _big,_ how is he ever going to thin the bone?—and presses START. He bares his teeth at the ceiling, bristles his spines as agony sears through his palm, but he doesn’t move. _He will not move._

His bone clatters to the table, and he bolts back to Papyrus’ side. The pup has slumped to the table, his eyelights absent and his body slack. Someone pounds on the door. He hears shouting—there’s so much shouting. An alarm begins to blare overhead. He snarls and glares at the bonesaw. For a moment, he manifests a pair of hands. They tremble violently, warping at the edges. _Shit._ There’s no way he dares to use the bonesaw with those hands, or with these fucking paws, but he can’t risk hurting Papyrus. 

Growling, he opens the door. Asgore stands in front of him, eyes wide and panicked. A horde of scientists and guards stand behind him. Sans bolts between his legs and into the room. “Dad, what the _hell?”_ he shrieks. “What are you doing to him? What are you—?”

He looks at his son—he looks at the only person who can understand him, with his broken voice and useless paws—and he asks him something he never, ever wanted to ask. “Help me.” His voice is a warped rasp. His claws twitch. He uses his magic to unlock Sans’ collar, flinging it against the far wall (a most worthwhile use of magic, that). “I need you to help me right now, Sans.”

Sans looks up at him, panting. “No shit.”

Gaster almost wants to laugh. Almost. “Draw a circle on Papyrus’ manubrium. We need to cut the bone out.”

“...what.”

“Do as I say. He needs a soul,” Gaster says. “I can give it to him, but it has to be now.”

“But you said—you said giving anybody else a soul would make you die faster,” Sans protests. “And you’re already hurt, your soul is already—already—”

“I know what I said,” Gaster snarls, and he hates himself just a little bit more when he sees how Sans shrinks closer to the floor, eyes widening. He tries desperately to gentle his voice. “I know what I’m doing, Sans. Now obey me or translate for someone who will.”

Sans shifts into his hominid form, grabbing the marker next to the table and tracing a wobbly circle onto Papyrus’ manubrium. He reaches for the bonesaw, but Asgore sets a paw over his hand.

“No,” he says. “You cannot make him do this, Wingdings.”

“No, _you’re_ going to do it,” Gaster says, his voice hard. Sans translates quietly, and Asgore’s eyes widen. For a moment, Gaster fears he’ll protest—but he doesn't. He reaches out with one shaking hand, and he picks up the bonesaw. He saws the circle out of Papyrus’ manubrium, breathing in choppy gasps. The saw grates against bone, rasps noisily, and Sans sits down near the wall, squeezes his eyes shut, and clamps his hands over his auditory canals. 

“Get him out,” Gaster says, looking pointedly at one of the guards, “but keep him where I can hear him.”

The guard scoops Sans up, carrying him from the room. Gaster sees his son begin to struggle, but he tears his eyes away before the sight of it can crush his soul any further. He focuses on Asgore’s work instead—meticulous, cold, quiet. The room breathes a collective sigh of relief when the bone clatters out of Papyrus’ sternum.

“Now file those down to fit,” Gaster orders, pointing at his metacarpals. Dim magic leaks from his empty palm, splatters on the table to blend with Papyrus’. Asgore files the bones down, fits them into Papyrus’ sternum and glues the outside edges at Gaster’s command. Gaster drizzles ethanol over Papyrus’ wound, and Asgore bandages it gently. “There. It’s done.”

Done, yes. He has given everything he has. There is nothing left but anger and a black, rotting pit in his chest.

Carefully, he nudges the mask off of Papyrus’ face and indicates to Asgore the proper injection to reverse the sedation. He picks Papyrus up in his jaws, then sets him down at Asgore’s feet. “He should be fine, albeit woozy. We need to get him somewhere safe and warm, and I’d like a doctor to look at him right away, before he wakes. Sans will need to be looked at, too.”

“And yourself,” Asgore points out. “Soon. Very soon.”

Gaster glances down at his soul. Somehow, he...doesn’t think a doctor will help.

Sans squirms into the OR again, his guard running helplessly behind him. He freezes when Gaster and Asgore look at him, and then he slinks forward and rests a hand on Papyrus’ skull. When he looks up at Gaster, there is fear in his eyes. 

Gaster remembers a promise he made in this very room, four years ago.

_And if I ever feel like I can’t take care of you properly..._

He looks at Asgore—leans forward, presses his muzzle to his king’s chest. Asgore’s arms wrap around him. Paws pet softly against the underside of his chin, and he aches. His eyesockets sting with the threat of tears, but he fights them back. Slowly, he lowers his head until he can brush Sans’ skull with the tip of his nose. 

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I didn’t mean to frighten you, and I shouldn’t have snapped. You’re wonderful, my little one. Never forget that—and never forget that your father loves you.”

Sans rubs a palm against the side of his jaw, leans into him. When he speaks, his voice cracks. “I love you too, Dad. It’s okay. Can we just—can we go home now?”

“Yes. You’re going to go home, Sans.” He dips his muzzle further, brushes it across Papyrus’ limp body. “And you as well, Papyrus. Your big brother will look after you—as will your Uncle Asgore.”

“And you,” Sans says, frowning. “You will too, Dad.”

Gaster smiles at him, and then he gets up and shakes himself off. He pushes his way out of the operating room, his monstrous claws clicking against the floor. Scientists—his teammates, his peers, his _friends—_ part in front of him, their gazes wrought with fear. He hears Sans’ tiny footsteps follow him out. “Dad?”

He does not look back. He cannot. 

He takes off, bounding up the stairs and away from his family for the very last time.

* * *

“Dad,” Sans shouts, bolting after his father. _“Dad!”_

Asgore grabs Sans before he escapes the OR, scooping him up and holding him close. “Sans, little one, you can’t go running off again! You—”

“Hurry,” Sans says, squirming irritably in Asgore’s arms. He only just got his dad back, he’s not _losing him again!_ “Hurry up, let’s go after him!”

“We’ll find him,” Asgore assures, although there’s a touch of panic in his own eyes. He bundles Sans tightly to his chest, then raises his voice and looks at the guards. “Go after Dr. Gaster at once, all of you. Find him, stay with him, but by the _stars,_ don’t hurt him.”

The guards bolt out of the hallway, shouting to one another as they stream out of the lab. The scientists watch them go, eyes wide.

“What about us?” Sans asks. “We have to go, too. He _needs_ us.”

“No. You’re going to Grillby’s.”

“What?! No!” (It is the first time, he thinks, that he has ever said that about Grillby’s.)

“You’re _hurt,_ Sans, and you’ve been gone for weeks! You need to be seen by a doctor, you need go somewhere _safe,_ you don’t need to be running around after someone that—that—”

“That _what?”_

“That...upset,” Asgore finishes lamely. It isn’t what he’d meant to say, and Sans knows it. 

“Let go,” Sans says.

“Sans, little one—”

“Let go of me.”

“I can’t. You aren’t thinking clearly, and you’re only a child. Trust me to do what’s best for all of us, won’t you? I’d never even think of—”

“I said—” Sans shifts shapes more quickly than he ever has, a savage snap-crackle-pop of bone, and sinks his teeth into Asgore’s hand. “— _let go!”_

Asgore cries out in pain and surprise, dropping him. Sans unlatches his teeth, landing on all fours and staggering away from him. Blood sticks to his jaws, trickles between his molars. His chest heaves, and he stares up at Asgore for a moment, eyes wide. Blood stains the white fur of the king’s paw, and he looks almost as frightened as Sans feels. Then his face smooths out, settles into something quiet and determined.

Sans bolts.

He gets about halfway around the corner before colliding with another monster, and he shrieks and bristles and bares his teeth. The monster stumbles away from him in a shower of yellow sparks, seconds before a low, dangerous hiss surges in the air around him. For a moment, he and Grillby regard each other with furious eyes and simmering magic.

The moment they recognize each other, the world falls silent.

“Grillby?” Sans asks, his voice trembling. The signing of his hand bullets is clumsy, in his raw panic, but it seems the elemental understands him anyhow.

“Sans.” Grillby drops to his knees, his eyes wide. His flames burn low but bright, streaked through with bolts of yellow. “Oh, Sans, you’re _okay,_ you’re _alive,_ you’re—” He stumbles over his words and lifts his hands to sign, instead. _I missed you! I was so afraid—are you well? What’s wrong? Why are you bleeding?_

He reaches out, brushing a hand across Sans’ jaw. The smell of blood as it burns is acrid and unpleasant, and Sans flinches away. Grillby immediately yanks his hand back. “I’m okay,” Sans says. “I’m—”

“Staying here,” Asgore says, behind him. “Don’t let him by you, Grillby.”

_Why not? What’s wrong?_

“What _isn’t?”_ Asgore asks grimly.

_Wait—Sans, if you’re here, then—where’s Gaster? Is he alright? Have you found him, too? And—_ Grillby’s eyes flick up, and Sans glances back. Asgore stands a few feet away, Papyrus bundled in his arms. _What is that?_

“This is—” Asgore falters, glancing down at Papyrus’ limp body. 

“Papyrus,” Sans says. “That’s my little brother, Papyrus.” 

_Your_ what—?!

“It doesn’t matter right now! We found Dad, but he took off—I don’t know where he’s going, but he needs to get to a doctor. He’s trying to give his soul to Papyrus, but he doesn’t have enough soul _to_ give.” Because Jackson was right, wasn’t he? Because children are _parasites,_ and they’re killing their father one day at a time. “Unless we can figure something out, Papyrus will take everything from him. Get it, Grillby? If we don’t find him right away, Dad’s gonna _die._ So come on.” 

Sans squeezes past him, trotting down the hallway with single-minded intent. 

Asgore groans. “Oh, angel above, you let him past you—”

“Sans.” Behind him, the room’s temperature spikes sharply. The air begins to clog with the heavy scent of smoke. He turns to regard Grillby warily. Grillby’s flames lash wildly, sparks crackling along his hands, and Sans recognizes his fear for what it is. _I will find your father, but we cannot lose you again. We only just got you back. Right now, your responsibility is to stay safe, and to keep your little brother safe, too. Gaster can’t live without you. That much has been made clear. What hope does he have, if we find him and lose you?_

“I’ll stay close by,” Sans protests. “I won’t get lost.”

_It isn’t worth the risk. Go with Asgore. I’ll bring Gaster back._

“He’s my dad.” Sans’ voice cracks, and his eyes sting. He shakes his head furiously. “I just got him back. I want to find him, I need to make sure he’s _okay._ I was so scared and then he found us and I thought everything was going to be fine, but now he’s gone again and maybe I’m his responsibility but he’s mine too, and so I—I can’t—I _can’t—”_

Grillby kneels and hugs him, and Sans falls limp against him, his chest shuddering around swallowed sobs. 

“I want my daddy. I want him back, I want to go home, I want everything to go back to _normal._ Why’d he have to leave? It’s not fair—it’s not _fair,_ he just came back and now he’s gonna die and he _left us behind,_ he—he just _left_ —”

“Shhh.” Grillby begins to rock him gently, cupping a hand around the back of his skull. Sans cries against him, overwhelmed with relief and anger and fear and emotions that are far, far too large for his tiny soul. “Shhh, Sans, hush, now. I know. This is awful, and I’m sorry you have to endure it. But listen to me—”

He pushes Sans back gently, meeting his eyes. Sans sniffles, scrubbing tears off of his face with the side of a paw.

_I am going to find your father, and I am going to bring him back to you. Trust me to do that for you, my little one, won’t you? I would never let anything bad happen to your father if I could prevent it._

Sans hesitates. “...but you can’t always prevent it.”

_No,_ Grillby admits, his flames dimming for a moment. _I cannot. But I’ll do my damned best—would that be enough for you? If I haven’t found him by tonight, I’ll take you out with me. Just go home for a few hours, get cleaned up, let Dr. Yeoman look at you. Can you do that for me? And for Papyrus? He’ll need Dr. Yeoman to look at him, too, and I bet it would be easier if his big brother was there to look after him._

Sans’ head droops as he relents—for Papyrus, if nothing else. If he cannot watch over his father, than he’ll damned well watch over his baby brother. “Only ‘till tonight.”

_Thank you. How brave you are._ Grillby scoops him up, handing him back to Asgore. 

“Bless you, Grillby,” Asgore says, breathing a sigh of relief and adjusting Sans in his arms. Sans curls up over Papyrus, nudging him gently—the pup is disconcertingly still, lax with unnatural unconsciousness. It’s...probably for the best, if Sans is honest with himself. Papyrus is bound to freak out as soon as he’s awake. “We’ll be back at the house—let me know if you need absolutely anything.”

_I will,_ Grillby says, already backing away. _I’ll let you know as soon as I find him._

Then the elemental flares yellow again (panic—he’s panicked, no matter how well he hides it) and runs from the lab. Asgore follows more slowly, his own face creased with worry. He takes them to their house, setting Sans down in the living room and locking the door behind them. Sans bounds through each room, driven by some vague hope that perhaps Dad came back here, perhaps he’s only upstairs, perhaps he only wanted the peace and quiet of their sanctuary—

But the house is empty, full of dust and shadows and nothing else.

Sans slinks back to the living room, his head low and his eyes darting. It doesn’t feel safe anymore, out in the open like this. What if Jackson escapes the guards? What if he comes back form them? What if he’s out there right now, hurting Dad?

Sans’ magic churns within his soul. He leaps up onto the couch, where Asgore had lain Papyrus, and curls tightly around him, resting his skull on top of Papyrus’. As long as they’re together, they can make it through. They survived for weeks before now, didn’t they? They’re going to be okay. Things have to be okay. Grillby’s going to find Dad, and bring him back, and then he’ll never ever ever leave again.

Asgore calls Dr. Yeoman, and the two of them talk for some time. She’s there within the half-hour, her face lined with unbearable sadness when she looks at him. He squirms uncomfortably, but does as she bids him, eager to get this check-up over with. His eyes continually skitter towards the door, yearning to see the soft glow of firelight or—even better—his father’s silhouette. He sees neither of these things.

In a rare stroke of luck, Papyrus doesn’t wake as Dr. Yeoman looks him over. She pronounces them both stable, although Papyrus is far from healthy. She speaks quietly with Asgore, and Sans gazes at the windows and listens—especially when they begin to talk about Papyrus. “...can’t tell much about his sensory or mental functions while he’s unconscious, but physically, he’s not well, Your Majesty. The only thing he has going for him right now is growth and bone density. Wherever he was, he had good nutrition.”

“How old is he?”

“I wouldn’t know. Blaster aging isn’t something I’ve any experience with. He’s about the size Sans was when he was three, but that’s not saying much. Perhaps Sans was small for his age. Perhaps he was large. One blaster isn’t enough to make a comparison to. But this one still has his baby teeth and his growth plates, so he’s no adult. I’m afraid all the other news I have for you is bad.”

Asgore rubs his face. “Go on.”

“He has an astounding number of healed fractures—fractures that I very much doubt he got while harmlessly roughhousing. He’s been beaten, and for quite some time. The fractures are at a variety of different healing stages. I’ll need an x-ray to give you precise ages, but—” Her voice dips with disgust. “Someone did that to him, and they did it with intent.”

“Would you mind telling that to the Guard, when they return? We’ll need to make a case for the Judge.”

“Oh, gladly. He also has bite wounds—some could be self-inflicted, but he’s got some on his skull that certainly aren’t. The bone around his nasals is thinner than it should be; I’ve no idea if it’s a genetic trait or another result of abuse. His claws, teeth, and spinous processes are all far sharper than they ought to be. I’d wager someone carved them to be that way. Of course, the worst of it is his spine.”

“What of it?”

“That box—” Sans hears Dr. Yeoman gesture in their direction. “It has wires that run throughout the entirety of his spinal canal. What’s worse, the wires have offshoots that embed themselves into the bodies of his vertebrae. It compromises the stability of the bone there, and I can’t even begin to imagine how uncomfortable it must be for him.”

“Stars,” Asgore breathes. “How can someone do that to a creature?”

“I don’t know. I simply don’t know.”

“And what of Sans?” 

“Better than the little one is, certainly. The only physical damage I see is his tail, and that’s healed well, but it’s no innocent wound. The cut is straight and precise—it looks like an amputation wound, and whoever amputated it knew what they were doing, although their healing magic left something to be desired. Fortunately, they didn’t mess the healing process up; they just didn’t heal it completely. It seems to be finishing the job well enough on its own.”

“And psychologically? How are they both?”

“I’m no psychiatrist, Your Majesty. You’ll have to see someone else for that. I can take a closer look at the little one’s mental capacities once he’s awake, but until then, I’d be careful.”

“Why?”

“Well, a child who’s been beaten for so long, a child with claws and teeth like that—he may be dangerous. I don’t mean to insinuate that he’s aggressive, but he’s just been pulled from a traumatic situation, and you—well. Yes, a psychiatrist is what you need. I can give a few references to Dr. Gaster, once he returns. He’ll be taking care of the new child, I assume?”

“Well—well, perhaps. We’ll see. I doubt he’s made any decisions yet.”

Sans curls more tightly around Papyrus. “Of course Dad’ll take care of you,” he murmurs, low enough that the adults won’t hear. “You belong here, with us. You’re our family, now. He wouldn’t be giving you his soul if he didn’t want you.”

...right?

Papyrus’ paw twitches, and he sighs softly in his sleep.

Dr. Yeoman takes her leave, after her initial assessment, and Sans lays quietly with Papyrus until the pup’s eyes finally open. Sans fully expects him to claw his way off of the couch, to run himself ragged around the house, to shriek and howl and claw the walls, but—he doesn’t. He wakes up, and he looks around himself, and then he sets his head back down and lays very, very still.

He does not move. He does not snap or growl or fight. He only lays and breathes and trembles, and Sans struggles to stay beside him and do the very same thing as the lights outside grow dimmer and their father does not return.

* * *

It is an odd habit of animals to seek solitude in the hours before death. It is that odd habit Gaster yields to now, as he seeks his peace in the empty forests far from Snowdin. The snow falls heavily behind him, fills in his tracks and hides his scent—a small mercy from a world that has finally succeeded in dealing him an unhealable wound. 

He digs himself a small trench at the base of an evergreen, and he curls up there. The snow blankets him, comforting in its weight, easily masking the white gleam of his bones. The chill of it numbs the smallest of his wounds, but even so—even so, everything hurts. The roof of his mouth throbs whenever he shifts his jaws, so he tries very hard not to. His skull and shoulder ache in agonizing waves. Both his scapula burn furiously, cramping in waves that leave him gasping. The IO needles sting whenever he moves, so he lies very still and does nothing but breathe.

Sometimes, he forgets to do even that.

He does not want to die. A foolish, hopeful part of him still believes he won’t. He has children to raise, a life to live, an enemy to see dead—he can’t _possibly_ die now. He refuses to. He’ll persevere, as he always has before. But a larger, more rational part of him understands that if death wants him, she will have him, and he has already outrun her for far, far longer than he should have. 

However, he refuses to die in front of his friends and family, and so he waits, and he hopes a futile hope, and he grieves. He grieves for the children that suffered because of his work. He grieves for the infants whose only glimpse of life was cages and cold tables and cruel hands. He grieves for the babies who died without even a glimmer of love tossed in their direction. He grieves for the future he may no longer have, because he is _rotting._

It is not the grief that rots him. Oh, yes, the grief hurts, but it is the _rage_ (the rage and the black, sickening guilt) that rots his soul and leave it splattered in black, tarry spots across the snow. It saps his will to live. It pushes him to just fall down, fall down, give up and fall down and find peace in nothingness—but a stubborn part of him perseveres, as it always has. A part of him wants desperately to survive, to return to his children, to let his village take care of him the way he does struggle so hard to do, to remember what warmth and happiness and love felt like.

It is that little piece that remains, when the rest of his soul runs black and thin. One little, dense spatter of white at the corner—that is all that keeps him alive. He doesn’t know how much longer it’s going to last. His anger, his guilt, his grief, they do not abate. They eat away at him. It’s only a matter of time until he falls down, or until Papyrus takes what little he has left.

The first evening, he hears a fire roaring nearby. The smell of smoke curls through the air, thin and acrid and full of fear—Grillby. His soul aches. Oh, how badly he wants to go to him, to go to one of his oldest friends, to find comfort in his warmth and strength. Doing that would only hurt them both more, though, wouldn’t it? Gaster doesn’t want to die in front of anyone he loves. How cruel it would be of him. How _shameful._ Although, if he could only say goodbye…

But that isn’t what will happen if he goes to Grillby, and he knows it. Grillby won’t let him stay here. Grillby will drag him back, back to hospitals and scientists and _labs,_ goddamned _labs,_ and Gaster isn’t going to die there. If he is to die, it must be here, in this peace and quiet and loneliness.

Grillby moves east, and Gaster shudders in the agony of their parting.

Days pass. Most nights, he hears the dogs howling from town—and he hears Sans with them. His is not the howl of communication or need or excitement. His is the howl of sickening loss, of searching, of hoping, desperately, that someone will howl back. 

Gaster never does.

He feels bad about it, in a way. He just got his little one back, so shouldn’t he be happy? Shouldn’t he be fucking estatic? Shouldn’t things be easier now, shouldn’t he feel better, shouldn’t everything be fine? And yet, _fine_ is the farthest thing from what he feels. Moreover, he can’t help but think like father, like son. This is precisely what his own father did to him—walking out, walking into a fate Gaster will never know. Abandonment runs through his bones. It is the last gift he has given to his sons, a family heirloom. 

He finds some peace in knowing, at the very least, that if he should die, his sons are still in a safe place. Asgore would never let them go without care—they’ll be princes, with him. Princes, in a happy home, safe and sound and healthy. It’s more than Gaster could ever offer. It is a promise kept. _And if I ever feel like I cannot take care of you properly, I’ll get you to someone who will._

Gaster can’t take care of them, not like this, not with this rot inside of him. They deserve far better than him—far better than a beast whose ambition created and killed hundreds. Besides, he knows he’s going to die eventually; if not now, then in a few months, if not a few weeks. His magic won’t be able to sustain him, once Papyrus begins leeching his soul from him. (Papyrus deserves a soul far, far more than Gaster does. It is no pain to give him one; he only wishes desperately that it didn’t mean he had to leave his children so very soon.)

So it is that he stays there, alone in the snow, and he waits on death.

* * *

“I want my _dad!”_ Sans shrieks, his fists balled up at his sides. He knows, in some logical part of his mind, that he’s overreacting, that shouting isn’t going to get him what he wants—but holy _fuck,_ what else is he supposed to do? “Grillby said I could help look for him if he couldn’t find him by now!”

Asgore sighs heavily, scrubbing his face with his paws. “I know what Grillby said, but Grillby isn’t your father, and—”

“Well neither are _you.”_ Sans bares his teeth. Papyrus crouches nervously behind him, his eyelights down. He won’t look at Asgore—hasn’t looked at Asgore for more than a few seconds the entire time he’s been awake. “My _father_ is out there somewhere _dying,_ and you’re making me stay here and let him. It’s not fair. I’m not gonna get lost, so just let me—”

“It is dark, and cold, and we are not going to find him tonight. The search parties are working, Sans. Let them do their jobs. You—”

“He won’t listen to them! He’s scared, and he’s hurt, but if I go out there then he’ll hear me and he’ll come find me and—”

“You are _not_ going anywhere tonight, and that’s final. Now, it’s time to get ready for bed.”

_“No!_ I’ll just run away again, I don’t _care—”_

“Sans, _I cannot lose you again!”_

The door slams open, and Papyrus flinches and huddles closer to the floor. Sans snarls, whirling around—Grillby stands in the doorway, his shoulders slumped and his flames low. _Grillby?_ he asks. _Where’s he at?_

_I’m sorry,_ Grillby says. _I’m sorry, little one. I haven’t found him yet. I won’t stop looking, but I just wanted to—_

“Take me out there with you. You said. You promised.”

“You are not to take him anywhere, Grillby,” Asgore says, his voice and the tone of his signing dipping into something authoritative and sharp—it’s a tone that has Grillby straightening up, soldier-ready, and Sans _boils_ with fury.

“Don’t talk to him like that!”

_“I_ am going to go look for him,” Asgore says. “Grillby, will you watch these two?”

_Yes, sir._

“But that’s not what you said, Grillby,” Sans says, his voice shrill with distress. Papyrus’ claws tap anxiously against the floor, his eyes snapping between all three of them. This is not the gentle homecoming Sans had wanted for him, but there will _be_ no homecoming if they don’t get their dad back. “You said you’d take me, you said you’d find him, you said—”

_Little one—_ Grillby reaches out to set a hand on his skull, and Sans smacks it away.

“Don’t _touch_ me! You’re a _liar._ You’re all liars.” He stumbles away from them, picking Papyrus up. Papyrus goes very still in his arms, his tail curling nervously between his legs. 

Grillby sighs, smoke curling from his mouth. _...yes,_ he signs at Asgore. _I’ll watch them. You’ll find the search parties near the Ruins. Please, call if you find anything._

“Oh, thank the stars,” Asgore says, relief clear in his eyes. “Yes, of course I’ll call. Do take care. It’s their bedtime—best of luck.”

The king beats a hasty retreat, and Sans is left to fume at Grillby, instead. He opens his mouth to speak, but Grillby brushes past him, heading for the kitchen. Sans doesn’t waste breath shouting, this time. It isn’t as though Grillby can hear him. Instead, he eyes the door—he could leave. Of course, Asgore had only just left, so he’d probably be caught right away. Best to escape through his window again, even if he has to wait until after bedtime.

That decision made, he stomps after Grillby, scooping Papyrus up and clutching him to his chest. He doesn’t think Papyrus enjoys being held (doesn’t think he’s ever _been_ held before) but he doesn’t want to leave him behind. What if he disappears, too? What if he runs off and Jackson finds him again? Irrational, Sans knows, and yet the worry plagues him. “What are you doing?” he asks, scowling, as Grillby begins to rummage through their cabinets.

_Making a snack. Has Papyrus had dinner?_

“No. He won’t eat. He’s too scared.”

Grillby winces. _Poor thing. How about something light?_

Sans watches grudgingly as Grillby pours milk into three mugs. He warms the milk between his palms, then drizzles in honey and cinnamon and slides a mug towards Sans. He pushes another towards Papyrus, who refuses to look at it or anything but the ground.

“I’m not hungry,” Sans says.

_I know. This will help you sleep._

“I don’t want to sleep. I want to find my dad before he _dies.”_

Fear shivers through Grillby’s flames again, yellow and sharp. 

“You’re scared he’s going to die too,” Sans accuses. “So why are we just sitting here? Why don’t we go look for him? You don’t _have_ to do what Asgore says.”

_He is my king._

“So what?” Sans flings his hands in the air. “Who _cares?_ If your king told you to let Dad die, you’d _let_ him? I thought you loved him! But maybe you’re not as brave as I thought you were. Maybe you’re just a coward.”

He expects Grillby to flinch, but the elemental only offers him a weary look. _You’ve a silver tongue, little one, much like your father. You’d best learn to use it for good instead of ill. You’re not going to manipulate me into letting you leave, I’m afraid._

“Afraid,” Sans spits. _“Afraid._ Everyone’s _afraid.”_

_Yourself included, I imagine. Listen to me, Sans. What you’re going through isn’t fair, and I know that you may not have the emotional capability to deal with it at this point in your life, but you have to understand that Asgore and I only want what’s best for you. If I let you go out there, if I let you fall ill because of the cold, if I lose you—stars, your father would kill me, and I’d let him. You’re his world. You’re what he’s going to come back for._

“I’m bait.”

Grillby shrugs. _Not quite as kind a way of putting it, but I suppose it’s accurate enough._

“Well, I would be _better_ bait if I were out there, where he could see me and hear me,” Sans points out, taking an angry gulp of his milk. It’s stupidly good, and that just makes him angrier. How dare _anything_ be good right now. 

To his surprise, Grillby agrees. _Yes,_ he says, sipping his own milk. _You would be. I’ll speak to Asgore about taking you out tomorrow, when it’s light outside and he’s a little calmer. I’m sorry I can’t keep my word to you tonight, but with any luck, Gaster will be home within hours, and we needn’t worry about it anymore._

Sans grinds his teeth. Grown-ups, he decides, are remarkably untrustworthy. 

_Come on._ Grillby stands, heading back to the living room. He settles in on the couch, flicking the TV on. 

“It’s time for bed.”

_Yes, it is, but you aren’t going to sleep if I put you to bed, are you? Why don’t you come watch something with me?_

Sans _fumes._ “I want to go to bed!”

_No, you want me to put you to bed so you can jump out of a second-story window and disappear again,_ Grillby says, his flames flickering bitterly. _I’m not a fool, and neither are you._

_“I don’t want to stay here!”_ Sans stomps his foot, his magic flickering angrily around him. The kitchen table rattles precariously. Grillby stands again, taking a step back towards him—but the moment he does, a low growl spikes behind Sans. He and Grillby both freeze. Sans’ magic snaps into silence, and he glances over his shoulder. 

Papyrus stands beneath the kitchen table, his spines bristling and his tail flicking behind his heels. His lower jaw scissors warily, and his claws scrape against the floor. His eyelights are all for Grillby, sharp and slitted.

“...Paps?” Sans asks. Papyrus doesn’t so much as glance at him. He only relaxes after Grillby takes a step back, his hands up and palms out. 

_What’s more, your brother needs you,_ Grillby says. _He’ll follow you wherever you go, won’t he? Would you have him follow you into the dark and the cold? Would you have him lost, too?_

Sans’ shoulders sag. “I don’t—he doesn’t have to—”

_Well, he certainly won’t stay with me. He doesn’t feel safe. If you leave, who knows how he’ll react? You need to stay here._

“He needs Dad.”

_We all need your father, and we are doing what we can to find him. A few hours more, Sans. Just stay here a few hours more, that’s all I ask. Come and rest. Tell me what happened. Perhaps there’s some clue we’ve missed that could tell us where Gaster has gone._ Grillby slumps onto the couch again, his eyes shutting briefly. _He won’t have left you just for fun._

Sans takes a few hesitant steps forward, and Papyrus slinks after him. Grillby lifts an arm, and Sans tentatively slips underneath it, curling up against the elemental’s side. Papyrus doesn’t follow him up; instead, he squeezes himself beneath the couch. His tail sticks out, still flicking irritably. 

_So,_ Grillby says, the both of them staring numbly at the TV screen. It’s playing Blues Clues. _What happened?_

So Sans opens his mouth, and he tells Grillby what happened—he tells his story in brief, clipped sentences, doing his best to keep his tone flat and his emotions dull. It’s easier than it should be, he thinks. Around him, Grillby grows warmer, his flames snapping and curling in anger. When Sans glances over, his flames boils red at the edges. 

Then the couch begins to smolder, and they both jump up, yelping in alarm and patting the flames out with Grillby’s jacket. 

Once the fire is out, they look at each other, their eyes wide, and then Sans begins to laugh—it’s a broken laugh, rough and vaguely unhinged, but it makes him feel the tiniest bit better. Grillby chuckles along with him, then brings a hand up, covering his eyes. Opaque yellow tears curl down his cheek, drip from the edges of his jaw and leave sooty streaks on the floor.

“Grillby?” Sans asks, suddenly very alarmed. He’s—never seen Grillby cry before, never ever ever. “Grillby, I’m sorry. I’m sorry please don’t cry.”

Grillby sucks in a shuddering breath, scrubbing the tears from his face with his forearm. _No, Sans,_ I’m _sorry. None of you should have gone through that. That’s—awful. What happened to you is inexcusable. You have every right to be angry and upset. And Gaster—oh, my Gaster—_

Sans reaches up, setting a hand tentatively on Grillby’s elbow. “Hey, it’s—it’s like you said, right? We’ll find him. Everything’s gonna be okay again. Right? Isn’t that right?”

Grillby makes a cracked sound low in throat but nods quickly. _Right,_ he signs, his hands shaking. _Right, Sans, that’s right. Just keep believing that._

And Sans tries. He really, really does. He clings to that belief as the night grows dimmer. He clings to it when dawn breaks and Asgore returns empty-handed. He clings to it as Grillby and Asgore argue in shouts and showers of orange and blue sparks and he sits in a corner and holds Papyrus and squeezes his eyes shut and pretends, desperately, that he’s somewhere else and his daddy is there holding him. He clings to it as he plunges outside later that very afternoon, attended closely by Grillby and the dogs—Papyrus sticks close to his side, shaking and skittering and still matching him stride for stride like the perfect military dog (because that is, after all, what he has been trained to be). He clings to it as he howls and shouts his throat raw in the forest of Snowdin, in the flats of Waterfall, in the desert of Hotland. He clings as, one morning, he wakes to hear Papyrus sobbing and finds the first speck of a soulshard gleaming in his baby brother’s chest. He clings. He clings, he clings, he clings. 

Fat lot of fucking good that does him.

Then, the same morning he gets his soulshard, Papyrus begins to claw at the door. An idea sparks to life in Sans’ mind. He yanks his jacket on, peeks around nervously for his current babysitter and, when the coast is clear, swings the front door open and plunges outside. Papyrus bounds for the forest—for the very first time (oh, but certainly not the last), he leaves Sans behind. Sans scrambles after him, his eyes wide with excitement, and the two of them follow Papyrus’ soullink into the wild.

* * *

A week later, Gaster feels the first prickles of pain and illness set in as Papyrus grasps for his soul. He lays his head down in the snow and he gives it willingly. If he struggles to live, it is only because he wants to provide more for his newborn—just a little bit more magic, just a little bit more love, just a little bit more. His chest aches. He pants in hot white plumes of breath. His tears freeze to his cheeks, and he rends the snow with his claws, because his anger, his pain, it has to go _somewhere._

He just wants to persevere a little longer.

Just a little longer.

Just a…

...little longer…

His form begins to fracture. There’s simply not enough magic left to sustain it. The cracks in his skull, so shoddily healed, reopen almost at once. The vision in his right eye vanishes. A series of fissures spring to life along his sternum. Splits travel through his right ulna, his left radius. He is so tired of breaking. He buries his head beneath his tail and he cries and he breaks apart. 

He hears footsteps.

His head snaps up.

His firstborn looks back him, tears spilling down his cheeks, his chest heaving. In front of him, a small blaster staggers through the snow. Gaster is too stunned and far, far too tired to move. The blaster reaches him and curls up immediately beside his chest. There’s a tiny, faint soulshard between their ribs. 

“How did you find me?” he murmurs. It hurts to speak—stars, does it hurt—but he forces himself to, for his son. Anything for his son.

“I didn’t. Papyrus did. He followed the soullink, because he needed you and you weren’t there.” Sans balls his hands into fists, furious tears lining his eyesockets. “Because you left us.”

“You shouldn’t be here. Go back to Asgore.”

“No.”

“Sans—”

“You don’t get to tell me what to do. You gave up that right when you _left.”_

He sighs softly, closing his eyes. “...yes. Perhaps I did.”

“I hate you.”

His soul recoils, and he flinches. “Please don’t say that.”

Sans sniffles, and Gaster hears him scrub a hand angrily across his eyes. “Why did you leave?” he demands. “Is it because you didn’t want Papyrus? Because I left that night when I wasn’t supposed to? Because you b-blame me for all of—all of this—” 

“What? No—no, Sans, never,” he says. “Never, baby boy. None of this is your fault. Don’t think that.”

“What am I supposed to think when you just—just _take off_ right after you find me?”

“I left because I can’t take care of you right now,” Gaster says. “I’m sorry. I’m not—” He shifts a paw, holds it over the black well of his soul. “I’m not okay. You need to go back to Asgore. He’ll take very good care of you.”

“I don’t want him, I want you! _You’re my dad!”_ Sans shouts, his eyes blazing. “You don’t get to just _leave._ You’re the one who’s supposed to take care of me, you’re the one who’s supposed to tuck me in and take me to the lab and help me teach Papyrus to talk.”

“You love Asgore.”

“Of course I do, but I love you too, and I want you there. I want you with me.” His breath hitches around a sob, and Gaster’s soul aches. “I want you to come home, Dad.”

“Maybe—maybe when I’m better—”

“Don’t lie to me,” Sans spits. “I’m not stupid. You came out here to die. It’s just like you said—you can’t keep two souls alive, not without giving up your physical form. You’re already—you’re already—” He gestures helplessly at Gaster, tears spilling over his cheeks. “You’re already dying. You think I can’t see it?”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to see this.”

“That’s why you left.”

“One of many reasons.”

“You’re so fucking selfish.”

“Yes. I suppose I am.” 

“Get up.”

“Sans—”

“Get up!” Sans demands. “Right now. We’re going home, and we’re going to a doctor, and they’re going to fix you.”

“A doctor can’t fix this.”

“Why not?”

Gaster shakes his head.

“No, you can’t just brush me off.” Sans stamps a foot in the snow. “Talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong so I can help!”

“There is no help. The physical wounds are nothing.”

“It’s your soul.”

“Yes. I told you. I’m dying.”

“Why?”

“Because everything hurts too much,” Gaster whispers. “Because I am very angry and very sad and I cannot stop feeling that way.”

“Well—well, we can help with that. We can make you feel happy again. We’ll just go home, and—and have some good food, and tell jokes, and see Grillby and Alphys and Asgore and—”

“I’m afraid it isn’t that simple.”

“Why not?”

“Emotions can become sicknesses, Sans, and then they don’t leave so easily.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I hope you never have to.”

Sans stumbles forward through the snow, dropping to his knees next to Gaster’s head and pulling Gaster’s muzzle onto his legs. “Well, I don’t care what you say. I’m not gonna give up.”

“You should.”

“I’m stubborn. Sue me. I get it from my dad.” He pets Gaster’s muzzle gently, runs his fingers along the cracks in his skull. “Papyrus, is he—is he taking a lot from you?”

Gaster peers down at the pup curled against his sternum. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Why does it have to be you? Why can’t someone else give him their magic?”

“Soul transfusions only work between two monsters who are genetically identical, more or less,” Gaster says. “Soulmagic won’t leave a body it belongs to—not unless it can’t tell the difference between one body and the next.”

“Because they’re the same?”

“Precisely.”

Sans reaches out to touch Papyrus’ skull. “That’s...all of us. Us three. We’re all mostly the same, aren’t we?”

“Yes, we are.”

“Then can I give Papyrus some of my magic?”

Gaster shakes his head. “No.”

“Why not?”

“You’re too little. You aren’t strong enough to—”

Sans laughs bitterly. “Me? _I’m_ not strong enough? Look at yourself, old man. You are _literally_ dying. If I can give Papyrus some of my magic, he’ll need less of yours. Right?”

Gaster doesn’t dignify that with an answer.

_“Right?”_ Sans demands, jostling his head. 

“He is not your responsibility. I will give him everything he needs.”

“He’s my little brother. He _is_ my responsibility, so let me take care of him.”

“You’re a child. I’m not putting that on you—”

“No, you’re not. I’m asking for it. Let me help him. Let me help _you._ Please.” He wraps his arms around Gaster’s muzzle, hugging him tightly. “Please, Dad. You’re my family. _We’re_ a family, and families take care of each other.”

Gaster’s eyes sting. “You realize what that means? If you give up your magic, you’ll be weaker. You’ll loose HP, AT, DF—”

“I know. I get it. I just want you stay alive.”

Gaster squeezes his eyes shut, his breath stuttering in his chest. “I might die anyway. I don’t know that I can keep from falling down, not while I’m—like this.”

“It’s okay.” Sans clicks his teeth across Gaster’s muzzle, a tiny skeleton kiss. “I mean, even if it’s just for the chance, it’s worth it. I love you, you know? I don’t want to live without you. Besides, I can live a pretty great life without being super powerful. I’d rather live a good life with you than a life as someone sad but strong.”

Tears roll down his cheeks to splatter in the snow. “Wisely spoken, my little one.” He takes a deep breath, and his heart breaks as he makes the choice to persevere. How selfish of him, how _selfish_. “I love you more than life itself. Do what you will. There is nothing in the world that could make a soul as full as yours weak.”

“Heh. Thanks, pops.” Sans reaches for Papyrus, who squirms and cries out unhappily. He settles the pup in his lap, gently placing a hand over his soulshard. “How do I…?”

“I’m not sure. I’ve never had to think about it. You shouldn’t have to give him a bone transfusion, since I’ve already started the link. You only need to tap into it. Just—give, I suppose. His soul is merely an extension of ours.”

Sans’ brow furrows in concentration, and he closes his eyes. For several minutes, they sit in silence, listening to the snow fall and the wind gust around them. Gaster tips his face up and remembers what the sunlight felt like, all those years ago. After a moment, Papyrus’ whimpering falls quiet. He begins to squirm towards Sans instead of Gaster, and Gaster feels the moment the soullink snaps between them.

It feels like heartbreak.

He gasps in a shuddering breath, his bones trembling. He opens his eyes—Sans’ hand glows faintly where it rests over Papyrus’ soulshard, and there’s a smile on his face. “Not too much,” Gaster murmurs. “Save some for yourself.”

Without a soulscanner, he has no way of knowing how much magic Sans gives to Papyrus—he only knows that the pup quiets, resting heavily against Sans’ chest, and that his soulshard gleams more brightly with every passing moment. Gaster curls more tightly around his sons, doing his best to shield them from the chill, though the breeze sweeps right through his ribs. When Sans sits back, he’s beaming.

“Look,” he says, rubbing his thumb over Papyrus’ sternum. “Look at his soul.”

Gaster looks. “It’s a beautiful soul, Sans,” he says, leaning his nose against Sans’ shoulder. Then, an echo of a compliment, spoken to him only a few years ago by the king of all monsters: “One of the very best.”

“Yeah.” Sans squeezes Papyrus to his chest, beaming. “It really is.”

He leans back against Gaster’s chest, and Gaster folds his front paws around him. For a moment, he rests, basking in the knowledge that both his sons have souls—they’re going to be okay. They’re going to love and be loved, no matter what happens to him. They have each other. Then he feels something...shift. He jerks his head up, startled. His soul begins to strengthen, the flicker of white in its corner edging out into the darkness. His HP ticks up.

Sans’ eyes glow blue.

“Stop,” Gaster says immediately. “Sans, _stop.”_

“I have enough,” Sans argues. 

Gaster snaps his teeth, using his muzzle to push Sans away from him—not that it does any good. Sans just scowls at him. “Listen to me, damn it! Keep what you can. I’ll be fine, you don’t need to—”

Sans waves him off. “Dad, it’s fine, seriously. I’d rather you have it than—”

His right eye suddenly sparks, and he cries out in pain, hunching over and pressing his hand to face. The vision in Gaster’s right eye flickers back, although it’s hazy and blurred and he can’t keep his eyesocket entirely open.

“I told you to _stop!”_ Gaster snarls, looming over Sans. He noses urgently at him, and Sans swats weakly at him. “Why don’t you listen to me?”

“Because you left,” Sans hisses.

“Oh, yeah? How long are you going to hold that over my head?”

“As long as I want to.”

“Move your hand, let me see.”

Sans grudgingly moves his hand. His eyesockets both look fine and intact, to Gaster’s relief. Slowly, Sans waves a hand in front of his face. “Um—”

“What? What is it?”

He waves his hand faster. “I can’t see.”

_“What?”_

“My right eye. I can’t see.” He’s beginning to breathe faster, his hands trembling. “Shit.”

“What do you mean you can’t see?”

“What do you think I mean, Dad? _I can’t see.”_

“Shit. Okay, _now_ we need to get to a doctor—” Get up, he has to get up, _get up._ One paw in front of himself, then the other. He props himself up with his front legs, panting, and then scrambles to get his hind legs underneath him in a single burst of movement. His bones creak and crack ominously. Oh, ow ow ow fucking _ow._

“You’re such a hypocrite,” Sans says. He clamps a hand over his right eye again, curling in on himself. Papyrus whines, nudging urgently at his arms. “I’m fine. I probably just used too much magic. I’ll eat a hamburger at Grillbz’s and it’ll fix itself.”

“Nope, up. We’re going to Dr. Yeoman’s. Get on my back.”

“Dad—”

_“Get up, Sans,”_ Gaster snaps, crouching. His shoulders shake. “Hurry.”

Sans gets up and scrambles onto his back. Gaster picks Papyrus up in his jaws, looking frantically around them. Which way is...back to town…? 

“Sans, which way did you come from?”

“Um.”

_“Um?”_

“I was having a little bit of a crisis, forgive me for not making a map,” Sans huffs. 

Gaster spins in a circle, his soul hammering weakly. Shit. Shit shit shit shit. Which way is out? Which way is _home?_ He picks a direction and sets off, putting his head down and breathing hard. It doesn’t matter which way he goes—he’ll get _somewhere._ If he reaches the cavern wall, he’ll go the opposite direction. If he reaches Waterfall, he’ll turn back. If he reaches the Ruins, he’ll be perpendicular to the town. Either way, he can orientate himself.

He only wonders if he’ll have enough energy to keep going.

Walking is a challenge. The breeze feels like it could blow him over, if he’s not careful, and every step sends bolts of agony through his body. His left forepaw in particular bothers him—he thinks the fresh hole there may be infected. He limps wearily onward, bracing himself against the snow flurries. One step in front of the other. A step. A step. A step. A—

A wall.

Huh. He was closer to the Ruins than he thought. 

“Woah,” Sans says. “What’s that?”

“The Ruins,” Gaster says. 

“Oookay—and what’s that?”

Gaster pauses, swaying on his paws. He’s weak. He’s far, far too weak. He has no idea how far from Snowdin they are, although he knows, now, what direction he needs to take in order to get back. If they got close enough to Snowdin, they could call they dogs. They could call the dogs now, he supposes, but who knows how long it would take them to find him? And then he’d have to walk all the way to Snowdin anyhow. On the other hand, he can’t stay here. Sans needs to get to a healer as soon as possible. 

...Gaster used to know someone who was very good at healing.

He staggers backwards, and Sans clings to his spine. “Dad? Are you okay?”

“Hold on,” he murmurs. “We’re going Home.”

“Wait—what are you doing, _what are you—”_

Gaster pulls upon the last of his strength and surges forward, lunging towards the immense purple wall in front of him. Sans shrieks in fear, but he doesn’t let go—if anything, he only holds on tighter. Gaster bunches his haunches and leaps forward and up. At the same time, he lashes out with the last of his magic, tears through space and time and everything sensible.

He jumps through the wall and lands in Home.

Of course, his landing leaves something to be desired. He hits the ground hard. His left foreleg buckles, and he topples head over heels before skidding to a stop on his side. Papyrus wails in fear, clawing his snout, and Gaster releases him. Sans scrambles out from under his shoulder, scooping Papyrus up and kneeling next to Gaster’s muzzle. Black spots dance in his vision.

“Okay, first of all, what the _crap,”_ Sans breathes. “Second of all: are you okay?”

Gaster tries to get his legs beneath him. He only manages to paw helplessly at the air. His breath comes fast and choppy, and the black spots morph into black oceans. The last thing he sees is his sons’ frightened faces, and the blur of bright red leaves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: gaster Still has no idea what it means to rely on others (although he does try to understand it!!) bc he lives in constant fear of abandonment and so he tends to self-isolate even unto Death. everybody say thanks, gaster’s dad, u fucked up a perfectly good child u irresponsible dick.


	18. the sacrifice

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to violence/death/dying/child abandonment, injuries, a pretty bleak outlook on life and the chances of it continuing, a brief reference to passive suicidal ideation

The first thing Sans does when Dad collapses is freak the hell out. The second thing he does is get to work. He sets Papyrus down a few feet away and cradles his Dad’s massive muzzle in his lap, running his hands frantically across the cracks in his skull. They’re spreading. No no no no—he tried! He’d given Dad some of his magic, he’d given him all he had  _ left  _ without disintegrating his own form, and it still wasn’t enough. That’s—

That’s fine. He doesn’t need a perfect form. He just needs his dad.

He takes a deep breath and summons the last reserves of his magic, preparing to push them back into his father’s soul (where they  _ belong).  _

Then he hears Papyrus growl.

He whirls around, a growl rising in his own throat. His little brother crouches defensively in front of them, looking anxiously at the monster who looms in front of them. Sans follows the line of a purple robe—follows it up and up and up, finds soft white paws and a gentle face with eyes as red as blood. His growl cuts off. For a moment, he considers all he knows and all he’s learned about monsters.

They are capable of doing awful, awful things. They have hurt him, they have hurt Papyrus, they have hurt Dad. But—

But they have also raised him. They have made him dinner. They have tucked him in and read him stories. They have taught him to walk and run and dance, they have laughed at his jokes, they have hugged him and teased him and loved him, they have been  _ good.  _

Monsters are weird, but maybe they’re still worth taking a chance on.

“Please,” he whispers to this new monster. “Please help us.”

“What do you need?” she asks, and Sans wants to smile and he wants to cry and he wants to remember what souls are really made of.

“My dad,” he says, leaning his head against his dad’s. “He’s really hurt, and I can’t—I can’t heal him, I’m not strong enough, can you—”

“I’ll do everything I can.” She kneels beside him, her robes pooling around her, and he pulls Papyrus into his lap and clicks kisses across his skull until his little brother realizes they’re safe and that he doesn’t need to growl. It takes longer than it should. Far, far longer. 

The monster sets her paws on Dad’s shoulder and closes her eyes. Her palms glow green, and Dad takes a shuddering breath. Sans leans his head against his dad’s, petting the crest of his skull and pleading, pleading,  _ pleading.  _ “Please, please, you have to stay here,” he whispers. “You have to stay with us. Papyrus needs you.  _ I  _ need you, okay? Everyone’s been worried sick. They all need you to come home.”

Hours pass, as he sits and holds Papyrus and pleads with his father. Above them, the lights begin to dim. The leaves rustle quietly in the breeze, falling from the trees like fat droplets of blood. Not once does the stranger get up or take a break or give up. The green light from her paws is soft and steady and irrepressible. There will be healing, if only his father is willing to accept it. Sans refuses to leave his side, murmuring quiet encouragement in Dad’s font, curling his fingers through his ribs as though if he holds tightly enough the world will right itself. 

In the middle of the night, Dad’s eyes snap open.

Sans beams. Relief is a cold wave against his spine. “Dad! You’re okay.”

The snarl that rolls through Dad’s ribcage assures him that this is not the case. Dad lurches to his feet, staggering, his head held low. He swings his skull around to face all of them, the sides of his lower jaw scissoring angrily and the spikes on the tip of his tail flaring into wickedly-sharp threats. His eyelights are dim, flickering weakly. His claws drag gouges through the soft dirt below them, his sides heaving.

The stranger rises slowly, carefully. She takes a step back.

“Dad, stop—it’s okay,” Sans says, putting himself between his father and the stranger. “It’s okay. She helped us. You don’t have to be mad, you don’t—”

Dad lunges at him, jaws open. Sans flinches, but he doesn’t move away, and when Dad’s teeth lock around his shoulders, they’re the gentlest thing in the world. He moves Sans away from the stranger, setting him down on the ground behind him, and then does the same for Papyrus, who squalls unhappily. Dad crouches in front of them, claws spread and spines bristling, and turns one massive eye onto the stranger.

“There, now,” she says gently, holding her hands up. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

His breath steams around his nostrils. His bones rattle.

“Or your children,” she adds.

Dad’s haunches buckle, hit the ground. He keeps himself propped up on his forepaws, but his head dips until his muzzle nearly touches the ground. His eyes close. Sans sets a careful hand on the small of his back, and Dad rumbles softly at him.

“Who are you?” the stranger asks, peering up at Dad, then back at Sans and Papyrus. “How did you get here?”

“I’m Sans,” Sans says, inching out from behind Dad. “This is my little brother, Papyrus, and this is my dad, Dr. Gaster.”

“Gaster?” the stranger says, surprise flickering across her face. “Any relation to Wingdings…?”

“Yeah,” Sans says. “That’s him. Wingdings Gaster. Have you heard of him?”

“No.” The stranger steps forward and, when Dad doesn’t snap at her, sets a cautious hand on his muzzle. “Not for a very, very long time. Wingdings—what have you done to yourself now, dear one?”

Dad rasps out a twisted version of a laugh, cracking his left eye open—his right socket droops heavily beneath its crack. Sans can only see a sliver of an eyelight within. “Too much,” he says. His voice is so warped that even Sans had difficulty understanding it. “Please...Your Majesty, my children…”

Sans dutifully translates, although he doesn’t particularly like what he hears.  _ Your Majesty…? _ “And my dad, too,” he adds. “Can you help him any more?”

“I’ll do everything I can for all of you,” the stranger assures them. She crouches, looking kindly at Sans and Papyrus. “I’m Toriel, little ones. I’m the caretaker of the Ruins.”

“You look like Asgore,” Sans says. “Were you—you were the Queen, right? We learned about that during social studies.”

Toriel smiles, although the expression doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Yes. Once, a long time ago, I was the Queen—but no longer. Please, call me Toriel. That goes for you, too, dear.” She straightens up and sets a hand on Dad’s muzzle again. “I’ll take care of your children. You have nothing to worry about now.”

Dad breathes a sigh of relief, his eyes sliding shut again. 

“Come inside with me,” she says. “It’s getting chilly—perhaps you skeletons don’t feel it, but I certainly can, and it won’t do any of you good to catch a cold.”

Sans glances up at Dad. “...are we gonna go?”

“Yes,” Dad murmurs. “Do as she says. You can trust her.”

“What about you?” 

“I’ll be along. I just—need a moment.”

“I won’t leave.”

“Sans, I’ll be right behind you.” He opens his eyes. “I promise.”

And if there is one thing his father has never broken, it’s a promise. Sans sets his jaw, then nods. “Okay. Don’t take too long or I’ll come out and bully you inside.”

“Deal.”

Sans scoops Papyrus into his arms, then turns to Toriel. “Okay. We’ll go with you.”

“And your father?”

“He’s gonna follow us. He just needs a second.”

Toriel hesitates, then nods. “Very well. I expect you soon, Wingdings.”

She leads Sans and Papyrus through several winding corridors and to a large purple house. Red leaves mound outside of it, and Papyrus squirms in his arms, sniffing the air. It smells like cinnamon and dried leaves and goat. Sans readjusts his grip on Papyrus—he may be small, but so is Sans, in his bipedal form, and Papyrus is proving to be more than an armful. 

“Are you hungry?” Toriel asks. “I can fix you something before you go to sleep.”

Sans shakes his head. “I’m not, but Pap could probably use something—do you have milk?”

“I certainly do.” Toriel slips into another room, and Sans drifts further into the living room. He hears her rifling around, and if the clatter of mugs and twist-pop of lids is anything to go by, the next room is the kitchen. “Warm milk, I assume? Does he like anything in it? Honey, or cinnamon, or…?”

“No thank you,” Sans says, leaning his head against Papyrus’. “We’ve just been giving him plain milk. Full cream.”

“I’ve got two percent—will that work?”

“Sure.” Sans actually isn’t sure what the difference is, and he doesn’t know if it matters. He wishes Dad were here to make all these decisions—although, based on the shitty decisions Dad has been making lately, that might not be an improvement.

“You boys can sit down, if you’d like. Make yourselves comfortable. I’ll be done in just a moment.”

Sans takes a seat at the table, rearranging Papyrus so he’s cradled against his chest. Papyrus seems—well, if not happy, than at least content to rest there, although he continues to shoot worried glances at the front door. “He’ll be in soon,” Sans says. “Don’t worry. A Gaster never breaks a promise.”

Even so, he can’t stop shooting the door little furtive glances, himself.

After a few moments, Toriel steps back into the living room. She sets a mug and a bottle down next to Sans, then takes a seat at the opposite end of the table. Sans regards the bottle tentatively—they haven’t tried using one with Papyrus before. He already knows how to eat and drink from bowls, so a bottle seems like a bit of a setback. Still, he’s not going to complain. Toriel’s doing more than she needs to for them. But how do you even...give a puppy a bottle…?

Sans reaches for it. It’s warm under his fingers, but not scaldingly so. He offers Papyrus the tip, and the pup glances up, as baffled as he is. “C’mon, buddy,” Sans coaxes. “Aren’t you hungry? You’ve gotta be. You drink it—like this.” He demonstrates, miming how Papyrus is supposed to drink from the bottle. 

Papyrus has gotten better at eating and drinking in front of people in the last week (it was that or go hungry, since the adults refused to allow them to be alone for more than minutes at a time), but he’s still not the most enthusiastic about it. After a grudging moment, he leans up, sniffing the nipple of the bottle before latching onto it and chewing. That’s not exactly how it’s supposed to be done, Sans thinks, but it seems to be working for him—at least until his fangs rupture the soft rubber of the nipple and milk dribbles down his chin and chest and all over Sans’ coat. 

“Oh, dear—here, let me grab a washcloth—” Toriel whisks back into the living room and returns with a rag, which Sans uses to clean himself and Papyrus as best he can. Papyrus whines, struggling to return to the bottle now that he’s realized there’s food inside of it. Sans can’t bear to tell him no, so he cups the rag beneath Papyrus’ chin to prevent further spilling and lets him finish his meal from the massacred bottle—he decidedly doesn’t look in Toriel’s direction as he does. He doesn’t want to see her reaction, because he’s almost certain it’s going to be one of disapproval. He  _ knows  _ he isn’t doing this right, okay? He knows he has no idea how to raise a child, no matter how hard he’s been trying to learn. Papyrus needs someone better, someone more experienced. He needs  _ Dad,  _ but Dad hasn’t been around to take care of him, because  _ Dad  _ has been busy running off and abandoning them and—

Sans takes a deep breath. Only after Papyrus is fed does he reach for his own mug. It’s good. Still warm. It reminds him of sleepy nighttime cartoons and snuggling with Dad on the couch, of gentle hands and climbing into his father’s bed after a nightmare. He cups the mug between his palms, glances at the door again.

“Little one,” Toriel says, and his eyes snap back to her. “May I ask—how did you get here? What in the world happened?”

Sans huffs out a soft laugh. “That’s a...long story.”

“Well, perhaps it had best wait until the morning, then.”

“Yeah. Is my dad coming in?”

With his sense of ever-impeccable timing, Dad chooses that moment to step through the front door. He has to crouch and suck his ribcage in to fit through the doorway without scraping it, and once he’s in the living room, he can’t do much more than curl into a ball and regard them all miserably. “Here,” he says, and sounds very unhappy about the fact.

“Well, hello there,” Toriel says, kneeling next to his head. “We’ve got a lot of work to do. You’ve got pellets embedded just about everywhere—I can’t heal the bone without taking those out, first. And the needles—”

“Please,” Dad murmurs. “Tomorrow.”

Sans translates. Toriel sighs and rests a hand on Dad’s nose, then nods.

“Very well,” she says. “Tomorrow. I’ll get you something to drink.”

She brings him a bowl of warm milk, and Dad sighs but drinks it—slowly, flinching with each ginger movement of his jaws. Sans’ chest aches, watching him. As Dad drinks, Toriel shows Sans and Papyrus to the bathroom and supplies them with two pairs of pajamas. Sans scrubs Papyrus’ bones off with a warm washcloth and lavender-scented soap, then does the same for himself. He tugs on a striped green shirt, then pulls one over Papyrus’ head, too. It’s far too large, and it doesn’t fit quite right, but he doesn’t want Toriel to think they’re ungrateful. Papyrus, who is quite accustomed to running around naked, has no such reservations. He growls irritably, mouthing at his sleeves and stumbling around the bathroom as he adjusts to his new attire. 

“It’s okay, buddy,” Sans says, reaching out to pet Papyrus’ skull—Papyrus flinches back. He does that more often when Sans is in this bipedal form. Sans can’t blame him. (But neither can he revert to his blaster form—he needs to conserve what little energy he has left, and the blaster can’t do that for him.) “You look super cool, don’t worry.”

When they get back to the living room, Toriel has layered Dad in several thick quilts. His eyes slide open when he hears them enter the room. “Sans,” he says. “See if Toriel can’t heal your eye.”

“Toriel?” Sans asks, setting Papyrus down next to Dad. The pup regards his father warily for a moment, then succumbs to the temptation of soft quilts and curls up a few feet away from him.

“Yes, little one?”

“Dad was wondering if you could heal my eye.”

“Your eye? What’s wrong with it?” she asks, frowning and kneeling in front of him. Her paws touch his face gently, angling it so she can examine both sockets carefully. 

“My right eye—I can’t see out of it.”

“This happened recently?”

“Just a few hours ago.”

Toriel’s frown deepens, but she nods. “Well, it looks like you’ve got a fracture in there. I’ll see what I can do. Just relax—it won’t hurt.”

Sans closes his eyes as he sees her paws begin to glow green again. It’s warm, and he can feel the pressure of a stranger’s magic against his own, seeping in amidst the cracks and searching for weak spots. It finds many. Sans wants to flinch back as it does, but the magic doesn’t take—it gives. It fills in the holes in his own magic, flushes him with new strength and energy, and he exhales in relief. 

“Wow,” he says. “You’re really good at that.”

Toriel chuckles softly. “I’ve had far too much practice.” A few moments later, she removes her paws from his face. “There. How is that?”

Sans takes a deep breath, then opens his eyes and—

And wilts. 

“It’s—good,” he says haltingly. “Everything feels better, but I still can’t see.”

“Oh, dear.” Toriel clicks her tongue. “Would you like me to try again? Maybe I missed something.”

So she tries again. She tries until they’re both exhausted and wretched with disappointed, and then Sans gently pushes her hands away. “It’s okay,” he says, even though it’s really, really not. “Maybe I just need to rest. We can try again in the morning.”

Toriel agrees, but there’s a tone in her voice that tells Sans even if they  _ do  _ try again in the morning—even if they do, his vision isn’t coming back. He’s half-blind. Looking at his father (at that broken, drooping right eye) he doesn’t think it’s a coincidence. He curls up underneath the quilts, burrowed against Dad’s side, his eyes stinging.

“Dad?” he whispers.

Dad rumbles quietly.

“Can you see? Out of your right eye?”

“...yes.” Dad twists his head around, resting his skull next to Sans. Deep sorrow aches within his eyes. “This was a sacrifice you should never have made.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. You were trying to do something noble. How can I fault you for that?” He sighs softly, his eyes sliding shut again. “I’ll try to give you some magic back tomorrow. Perhaps that will right things. But right now, I’m afraid I can’t, not without shattering this form. I have nothing left.”

“That’s okay. I’m okay, really. Who needs both eyes, anyway? Two of anything is just excessive.”

Dad actually chuckles. “Yes. Exactly what I thought when you asked for a brother.”

“Do you...like him?”

“Who? Papyrus?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t know him.”

“Okay, but—do you want to know him?” Sans studies his hands. “Are you gonna let him stay with us?”

“Of course I will, little one. He’s your brother, is he not?”

A smile tugs at Sans’ face. “Yeah. Yeah, he is.”

“And he is my son.” Dad sighs softly. “You’ll have to tell me more about him, tomorrow.”

“You got it.” Sans snuggles closer to Dad’s ribcage, looping an arm through one rib and closing his eyes. “Night, Dad.”

“Good night, Sans. I love you.”

“Love you too, pops.”

* * *

Dad doesn’t wake up in the morning. Sans only wakes because his father’s labored breathing jostles his ribcage—and, by extension, Sans. Immediately, he’s on his feet, his eyes wide and panicked. Dad’s struggling for air; choking breath in and shuddering it out, his claws twitching. Magic froths at his mouth, drips over his fangs—black, sticky magic. Sans yanks the quilts out of the way to see his soul, and his eyes sting. Dad’s soul is poisonously dark. The glimmer of light in the corner is as faint as Sans has ever seen it. 

“Dad?” He grabs one of Dad’s fangs and shakes his skull. “Dad, wake up. Wake up!”

Papyrus jerks awake with a startled whine, bolting away from them and cramming himself under the armchair. Dad doesn’t react at all. Toriel is there in moments, awakened by his shout. She kneels next to him, runs her hands over Dad’s ribs and grasps the situation immediately. 

“How long has he been like this?” she asks. Her hands already glimmer green. 

“I don’t know,” Sans says, curling his fingers through Dad’s ribs and clinging. “I don’t know, I just woke up and he was—he was breathing like this, and he won’t wake up—what’s wrong with him?”

“His soul is fading.”

“Why?” Sans demands, glowering at his father’s soul, as though he can reverse its rot through sheer force of will. 

“I don’t know, child. Only your father knows that. Monster souls are made of magic, of love and hope and compassion—if he loses those things, he loses his soul, and his form will follow after.”

“He’ll fall down.” Sans’ voice trembles.

“Yes.”

“But he hasn’t lost those things! He loves us,” Sans says. “He loves his friends.”

“So he does,” Toriel agrees. “No doubt that’s why he’s held on for so long—but love can only get you so far, little one, as painful a fact as that is to accept. He needs more.”

“What? What does he need? I’ll do anything.”

“Hope,” Toriel says. “Peace, security, kindness. Time.”

Sans buries his face in his hands and groans. “We don’t have  _ time.” _

“Four out of five is nothing to scoff at.”

Sans scrambles to sit at his dad’s head, crawling up to sit on his muzzle and glower directly at eyesockets. “Okay, you are  _ not gonna die,”  _ he says, “or I’ll be so pissed at you. You have to stay in order to watch Papyrus grow up; c’mon, don’t you wanna know more about him? And what about me? Don’t you want to see me graduate kindergarten? Or—or high school, even? Or  _ college.  _ What if I become a scientist like you? You have to be there!”

“Good, little one. Keep talking to him.”

“And—and you have to come home to see all of our friends again,” Sans says. “Asgore sent the dogs out looking for you every single day. And you should have seen Grillby—he was ready to burn down the whole forest just to find you. I think he would’ve, if Fuku hadn’t calmed him down. The bar hasn’t been open for  _ days.  _ Plus, Alphys has been absolutely  _ miserable.  _ She won’t leave her lab for anything; she’s too busy trying to figure out some way to track your soul-signature.” 

Dad’s eye opens a sliver. A growl begins to rumble in his chest.

“Listen, I know you’re angry, but you can’t let it ruin your life like this! I know really,  _ really  _ shitty things have happened to you, and you didn’t get choice, but right now you get to choose whether you get better or whether you let all—all the bad feelings eat you alive until there’s nothing left! And if  _ I  _ can get better, and if Papyrus can get better, then so can you.”

Dad’s eyelights flicker. He paws at the air, a vague attempt to get his feet under him.

“I know you feel bad. I know you feel really really bad,” Sans says, tears stinging his eyes as he sees his father’s  _ helplessness, _ “and I’m sorry. I’m sorry about what happened to you. I know you feel angry, and guilty, and sad, but that’s not all life is. You know that. You’ve felt good things before. You remember? You remember what love feels like? Or hope? Or curiosity? You’ve gotta remember those things. You’ve gotta fight to feel them again. You can’t just give up. Everyone’s rooting for you.”

Dad shifts his head, and Sans scrambles off of his muzzle. For a moment, he thinks his father is going to stand—or at least sit—but his head thumps to the floor again, and he groans. 

“Hey, it’s okay.” Sans sets a hand on his nose. “You don’t have to do it all at once. We’re here to help you, alright? You just have to be willing to try. You just have to stay with us.”

“‘s hard,” Dad rasps, his sides heaving. “I’m so...tired, little one…”

“I know,” Sans whispers, pressing his forehead to Dad’s. “You can rest here, you just can’t give up. Promise. Promise you won’t give up.”

Dad whines, high-pitched and miserable.

“That’s not an answer.  _ Promise,”  _ Sans demands.

“I hate...making promises…”

“No, you hate breaking them. There’s a difference.”

Dad sighs again, his ribcage shuddering. “I can promise that I’ll try, Sans. I’ll try very hard.”

“Okay.” Sans rubs his palm against Dad’s jaw, taking a shuddering breath. “I’ll hold you to it, old man.”

Dad struggles to breathe for hours after that, but he doesn’t fall down, and the cracks in his form don’t grow any worse. Sans considers that a victory. He only leaves his father’s side to eat breakfast and lunch (or, more precisely, to get  _ Papyrus  _ to eat breakfast and lunch, because his brother refuses to come out from under the chair otherwise). By the time dinner rolls around, however, Dad manages to lay on his stomach instead of his side, and he holds his head up under his own power. 

“Thank you,” he says, when Toriel brings them dinner—taco casserole and chocolate pie. “For everything, Your—Toriel. I’m very grateful.”

Sans translates through a mouthful of pie.

“You’re more than welcome,” Toriel says, taking a seat in her armchair. “But when you’re ready, I would like an explanation as to what brought you here, and in this state.”

“And an explanation you’ll get,” Dad agrees, poking halfheartedly at his food. “It’s the least I can do.”

“What’s wrong? Aren’t you hungry?”

“Ah—I am, but it—hurts.” He clicks his fangs together, grimacing.

“What does?”

Dad opens his jaws to reveal the smattering of deep indents within the roof of his mouth. Inside each indent is a small silver pellet. 

“Oh, dear—” Toriel rises, bracing her paws on Dad’s fangs to keep his mouth open as she peers inside. “Won’t you at least let me heal that for you? You need to eat if you’re going to get any better.”

Dad reluctantly rests his head on the ground, and at his prompting, Sans wedges the fire poker between his teeth to prop his jaws open. 

“What?” he teases, taking a seat next to his father’s head as he finishes his own casserole. “Too lazy to hold your own mouth open? Hey, at least now I know where I get it from.”

Dad snorts. Toriel cimbs quite unabashedly into his mouth and goes to work. She plucks each pellet from Dad’s bone with a pair of tweezers, and plunks them into a small bowl. Sans keeps a count. One. Two. Twenty-five. Fifty. A hundred. Two hundred. Two hundred and fifty. Two hundred and fifty-three. 

“Jeez,” Sans says, trying desperately to ignore the horror seething in his chest. “You didn’t even try to dodge.”

Dad’s tail flicks in annoyance. He winces with each touch to the roof of his mouth, his claws flexing against the carpet and his spines rattling. Once or twice, the hum of a low growl starts in his chest, but he cuts it off sharply. After Toriel has removed all of the pellets, she gently swabs the roof of Dad’s mouth with hydrogen peroxide. 

“There,” she says, removing the fire poker. Dad shuts his mouth and clacks his jaws. “That should feel better already. I’ll mend the bone as much as I can, but you’ll need to rest and eat if you want to recover quickly.”

After Toriel has healed the roof of his mouth, Dad obediently tucks into his food. He still winces as he chews, but he manages to get all of it down. Now that Dad can more or less speak with cringing, Sans feels a little better about interrogating him after Toriel’s gone to bed.

“So,” he says, snuggling under the quilts and looping an arm through his father’s ribs again. “What the hell  _ happened  _ to you?”

“Better question—when did I give you permission to swear?” Dad turns one critical eye on him. “I don’t recall that I did.”

“Ugh, Dad—everybody swears.”

“Five-year-olds don’t.”

“Yeah, well, five-year-olds don’t generally get kidnapped, either, so hey—appreciate my uniqueness.”

“I do. Every day.” Dad pushes his nose to Sans’. “But that doesn’t mean you’re allowed to swear yet. Stop it.”

Sans groans and wallows. 

“Well, what do you want Papyrus to learn?” Dad demands, sniffing haughtily. “He’ll copy you, you know. That’s what children do.”

That’s just about the only thing that convinces him. “Alright, alright, fine—but back to the matter at hand, Mr. Avoidance. What happened to you?”

“I could ask you the same thing.”

“Well, duh, but I asked first.”

“Very well. I suppose it’s best I tell you before I tell Toriel.” He curls his tail around Sans, resting his head on his paws. “I went to speak with Jackson—you recall that. When I came home, you were gone. We looked for you as soon as we could. Asgore had the entire Guard on the case; we searched everywhere. The dogs found your dust in Hotland.”

Sans winces. His tail is but a phantom pain, in this form, and he’s glad for it. He loathes looking at the reminder of that injury.

“I grieved for you, little one. It killed me to think that you were dead.”

“Is that when your soul started...you know?”

“Yes,” Gaster murmurs. “More than likely, though I didn’t notice it at the time. I went to Hotland for a time, after that—I brought your dust with me. I brought it everywhere. I couldn’t bear to part with you.” He takes a deep, shuddering breath, and Sans hugs his ribs harder.

“It’s okay,” he whispers. “I’m here now. I’m alive.”

“And thank the stars for that. But I—I broke the bowl your dust was in, in Hotland. Jackson happened to be there; he offered to lend me another bowl, so I went home with him. How foolish.”

“He was lucky,” Sans says. “That’s all. He was lucky you were there, and that you dropped the bowl, and that you were too busy grieving to think straight.”

“I should have known. I should have seen through him. You told me, did you not? You told me he made you uneasy.”

“Stop it. Don’t be mad at yourself.”

Dad shakes his head. Sans hardly thinks that’s the end of it, but for the moment, he drops it and moves on. “I went with him. He used 134—he used  _ Papyrus  _ against me. I couldn’t hurt him.”

“Good,” Sans murmurs. “I’m glad. I mean, not that you were manipulated, that’s gross, but that—I’m just glad you didn’t hurt Papyrus.”

“Me too.” Dad glances briefly in Papyrus’ direction. The pup has slunk out from beneath the armchair to rest on the quilts again. His paws twitch as he dreams. “Then he put a collar on me, so I couldn’t escape using my magic.”

Sans glowers up at the collar he sees, still embedded viciously into Dad’s vertebrae. “It’s too small.”

“Well, it fit properly when I was a skeleton.”

“Jackson’s an asshole.”

“Sans.”

“What? He is.”

“Well, I can’t argue that.” Dad sighs heavily. “After the collar, I suppose I gave up for a time, although I knew I had to free to the other blasters. That’s what I held on for while I let Jackson do what he wanted to me, which was—” He grimaces, motioning at his body. “This.”

“He turned you into a blaster.”

“Indeed.”

“How?”

“It’s a little complex. I’ll let you read the papers when you’re older.”

“When I’m six?”

“When you’ve completed high school biology, perhaps. Anyhow, this was the result. I’m a beast.” He sighs softly, closing his eyes. “There’s justice in that, somewhere.”

“No.”

“No?”

“Nuh-uh. There’s no justice in it. You didn’t do anything wrong. It wasn’t you who created all those kids and then killed them. It wasn’t you who hurt so many people. You didn’t deserve what happened.”

“It’s my fault Jackson was able to do this. I created the project. I designed the very code that allowed those children to be created and tormented. Fitting, that I should suffer the way they did.”

Sans scowls. “No it’s not.”

“...very well,” Dad says, weary. “If you insist.”

“I do. So can you—change back? Into a normal skeleton?”

Dad shudders. “No, and I’d rather never try.”

“How come?”

“It hurt.” His voice becomes a warped hiss, for a moment, his eyelights flashing brighter. “Stars, did it hurt, Sans. I wouldn’t endure that again for anything.”

“It’s not supposed to hurt.”

“How does it feel? For you?”

“Just—normal, I guess. I dunno. I’ve never thought about it.” Sans scratches the back of his neck. “A little warm, maybe? Everything gets warm and loose, like melting, and then I’m in a new shape. It never hurts.”

“I’m glad. But now I want to know—what happened to  _ you?” _

“I, uh—left the house when you went to talk to Jackson,” Sans says. “But you figured that out.”

“So I did,” Dad says, his voice grim.

“...are you mad?”

“No.” Dad takes a deep breath, glancing away. “No. You’ve learned your lesson. Nothing I say or do will impact you more than what Jackson did. There is no point in anger. Don’t do it again—but I don’t have to tell you that.”

“No.” Sans laughs weakly. “No, you don’t. I won’t do it again, not ever.”

(Well. With a few stipulations, of course.)

“Good. What happened, after you left the house?”

“I went to Jackson’s house. I wanted to wait and make sure you were okay. I didn’t trust him. It’s a good thing, too.” He frowns, flopping onto his back. “But I fell asleep under the porch, and when I woke up, you were leaving. Jackson left after you, so I snuck into his house, just to—I dunno, make sure everything was okay. Something didn’t feel right.”

“You’re keen, Sans.”

“Thanks. So I went in, and I went to the basement. I saw everything, and I wanted to go get you, I really, really did, but Jackson came back before I could get out. He put me in that cage, in the room with Papyrus. He—” Sans swallows hard. “He cut off my tail, so he could spread my dust in Hotland and trick you into thinking I was dead.”

Beside him, Dad trembles. His spines lift. “How dare he,” Dad says. “How dare he do that to you. I should have killed him. I should have—” Another splatter of thick black magic from Dad’s soul to his ribs. Dad snaps his teeth at the air, a heavy  _ clack  _ of noise that sends chills down Sans’ spine.  _ “I want him dead.” _

Sans shudders and curls up. That isn’t his father’s voice. He’s never heard it like that—cold and hard and violent. It petrifies him far, far worse than anything Jackson could ever do.

“Ah—I’m sorry, little one.”  _ That’s  _ his father’s voice, soft and repentant. “I shouldn’t say things like that.”

“But you meant it.”

Dad doesn’t reply. 

“You’re still really angry, huh?” Sans whispers. 

“Yes.” Dad squeezes his eyes shut, curling up more tightly around Sans. His hind leg jostles Papyrus, who flinches and opens his eyes. He takes in the scene, then retreats to the armchair again. Sans’ soul stings. “Impossibly so. But that is not your problem to fix—I’ll deal with it. What about you? Are you angry?”

Sans studies his hands. Two soft white eyelights watch him from under the chair. “...no. Not really. I’m just sad.”

“That’s understandable. Perhaps when we get back to Snowdin, I’ll see about a therapist for you.”

Sans beams.

“What?” Dad asks, arching his bonebrow. “You’re that excited about therapy?”

“No—you said  _ we,”  _ Sans says, reaching up to poke his dad’s foreleg. “When  _ we  _ get back to Snowdin.”

“Mm, yes.” A faint smile flickers across Dad’s face. “I suppose I did.”

When Sans sleeps that night, his dreams are soft.

* * *

“Grrr—yeah, lookit you, tough guy,” Sans says, graciously allowing his little brother to haul him around the room with an old t-shirt Toriel had kindly converted into a tug rope. “You’re so strong; you must be the strongest puppy in the whole world, seriously.”

Papyrus growls his enthusiastic agreement, yanking his whole body backwards in sharp jerks. His teeth are locked firmly into the t-shirt, and each yank sends Sans stumbling forward a few more steps. Papyrus’ eyes shine—then Toriel steps into the living room with breakfast, and he rushes to hide beneath the armchair again. That’s okay. Baby steps. At least he’d felt comfortable enough to actually  _ play,  _ today. He hasn’t done that since they left Jackson’s. 

“Look, Paps.” Sans takes two dishes from Toriel—a plate of pancakes and a bowl of the same, each drizzled with syrup. Sans scrapes the syrup from Papyrus’; no way will he eat that. Sans will be lucky if he finishes the pancakes by themselves. “Pancakes. You wanna try some? They’re good.”

He slides the bowl towards the armchair and listens to his little brother’s intrigued snuffling. As he waits, he digs into his own pancakes, hoping to lead by example.

“How has he been adjusting?” Dad asks quietly. He doesn’t look at Papyrus; any prolonged staring, they’ve both discovered, leaves Papyrus wired. Not  _ anxious,  _ per se, just extremely—intent, as though he’s expecting a command that never comes. 

“To pancakes?”

Dad snorts. “To everything, bonehead.”

“He’s—doin’ okay,” Sans says. “He eats normal food, mostly, although the first couple days he didn’t want to, and it made him kinda sick. Asgore was too busy looking for you to buy any of Pap’s old food, though, and I guess that kind of stuff is only made in the labs, anyway.”

“What was he eating?”

“Some kind of meat mash.”

“Ah.” Recognition flickers in Dad’s eyes, and he frowns, his tail flicking. “But he eats monster food now?”

“Mostly. Some stuff he doesn’t like. Super sweet stuff, or super greasy stuff, or, you know,  _ super  _ anything. He doesn’t like loud noises or strangers or not-strangers or carpet or sticks or wide open spaces or strong smells or birds or people who walk on two legs and every time he sees someone in a lab coat they get all of his attention.”

“Now, when did he have a chance to see someone in a lab coat?”

“The second time a doctor came to look at him—at us.” Sans shrugs, watching out of the corner of his eye as Papyrus edges out to sniff the pancakes in his bowl. “He was asleep the first time, but not then.”

“And how was he?”

“Very well-behaved. He didn’t bark or growl or anything, he just—sat there.”

“And physically?”

“Healthy, mostly,” Sans says. “His long-distance sight is off, but Dr. Yeoman said that was probably because he was kept in a small room for most of his life. She said it’ll improve, if he uses it more. His joints were a little stiff, but, again—kept in a cage, and at least part of the time, it was a cage that was  _ way  _ too small for him. If we can help him flex his joints more, he should be fine. She showed Asgore some physical therapy to do with him, but he didn’t like Asgore very much. Two legs and all.”

“What about you? Does he like you, on two legs?”

“Not as much as he likes me on four legs.”

“Then why are you in this form?”

“Because the blaster takes more energy,” Sans says. Papyrus snaps up a bite of pancake, then retreats again, chewing underneath the safety of the armchair. 

“Come here.” Dad leans forward, and Sans sets down his plate and goes to his side. His dad studies his right eyesocket critically for a moment, and then Sans feels something shift. His soul flushes with warmth, with energy—and then he bops his dad in the nose with the flat of his palm. 

“Stop it! You don’t have enough energy to take care of your own form, let alone  _ mine,”  _ Sans says, glaring and shoving Dad’s energy back through their soullink. He thinks, briefly, about snapping the link. It would be better, wouldn’t it? Even as much as he tries not to, he’ll still take energy from Dad, as he grows. He’ll have to, especially since Papyrus will be taking energy from Sans himself. So, in a way, has he really done his father a favor at all? Soulmagic has to come from  _ somewhere. _

“Sans—”

“It’s true, isn’t it,” Sans says, his voice hollow. “What Jackson said. We’re going to kill you. We’re going to use up all of your soulmagic and then you’re going to die.”

Dad glances away. “Yes. I had only hoped it wouldn’t happen so quickly, and that the magic I had to give wasn’t so—” He shifts a paw over his sternum, the dull gleam of his soul. “—tainted.”

“How long?” Sans demands. “How long did you have, before this?”

“With you? My best estimate was eighty years. You didn’t take much. With Papyrus, too?” Dad rests his chin on the floor, closing his eyes. “I don’t know. Weeks. Months, perhaps, if I was lucky. Papyrus takes quite a bit more magic than you ever did; he’ll take it from you, and you’ll take it from me. But you bought me some time, which I appreciate, little one. I only wish it hadn’t cost you so dearly.”

“What if we—what if we both stop taking magic?” Sans asks, pacing anxiously in front of Dad.

“Your souls will stop growing. Your AT, your DF, your HP—all of it will remain exactly where it is now. Your forms, too. Without more soulmagic, they won’t be able to grow. I don’t want that for either of you.”

Sans jams his hands into his pockets. No. He—he couldn’t do that. For himself, yes. For Papyrus? ...no. His little brother deserves to grow and thrive. He does make a decision then, though. He’ll take what magic from his father he can, but he won’t keep any of it for himself. He doesn’t need it. He’ll send it all straight to Papyrus. Maybe then Papyrus will grow faster, and it’ll almost be like Dad only has  _ one  _ kid draining his magic. 

...he doesn’t mention this decision to his father. He never will.

“Okay,” Sans says. “Fine. So we can’t just stop taking magic from you. There has to be some way to get you  _ more  _ magic, though.”

“No. Soulmagic can’t be replaced by anything but more soulmagic, which, as you can imagine, comes only from souls. Unless I gain an entirely new soul or go on a murder spree, the amount of magic I have is limited to what my parents gave me.”

“So—so let’s get another parent,” Sans says. “Somebody else to help give me and Papyrus soulmagic, so you can keep yours.”

“It’s not that easy.”

“Why not? People make babies all the time, and they always have two or more people to make the soul.”

“They also give their children souls while they’re still in the womb, and they all make a genetic contribution. Souls follow bodies. Bodies follow souls. They’re intrinsically connected. If you had someone else’s genes, then  _ perhaps  _ I could figure out a way to link their souls to yours, but you have  _ my  _ genes. That’s why I had to be the one to give you both souls in the first place. A soul transfusion wouldn’t have worked unless you were genetically identical to me.”

“So can’t you—I dunno, edit somebody else’s genes into ours?”

“No,” Dad says, his voice falling flat and cold. “Not without carving your marrow out, replacing every stem cell in your body, sticking you in solution to encourage replacement of every  _ other  _ cell in your body, and putting you through hell. I won’t do it.”

“Well there has to be  _ some way  _ you can live longer! Look at the  _ rabbits—”  _ Sans says, gesticulating wildly. “They have, like, twenty kids, and they still live thirty years.”

“Yes, because their forms are small and easy to maintain. And have you  _ seen  _ their stats? They’re all—”

“I don’t want you to die!” Sans shouts, his voice cracking. “You can’t die! You’re my dad!”

“All dads die, Sans. It’s a fact of life.” Dad pushes himself to his feet, turning his back on Sans before curling up on the floor again. “Life isn’t fair. Best get used to it now. You see? This is why I left you with Asgore. This is why—”

“You’re being an  _ asshole!” _

“What did I say about swearing—”

“Agh!” Sans grinds the heels of his hands into his eyesockets. Fury flushes white-hot along his bones, and he gives them a good, rattling shake. “You’re not even  _ trying  _ to figure something out. You’re just telling me all the ways I’m wrong!”

The front door swings open, and Toriel sticks her head inside. Her gardening gloves are damp with dirt. “Is everything alright in here?”

“It’s fine,” Dad says.

At the same time, Sans says,  _ “No.  _ Can I come with you, please?”

“Certainly, little one,” Toriel says, and Sans stomps out and into the front yard to seethe in peace. Papyrus rushes out after him, tucking his tail and slinking past Toriel. He doesn’t hear what Toriel says to his dad, but it doesn’t sound particularly pleased. He takes a seat in the leaves beneath the barren tree in the yard, crumpling several between his fingers. Papyrus curls up just outside of the leaves, eyeing them warily. 

“I can’t believe him,” Sans tells the pup, pulling his knees to his chest and resting his chin on them. “It’s like he  _ wants  _ to die.”

Papyrus sighs in agreement.

“Are you well?” Toriel asks, taking a seat next to him. She smells like flowers. “I know how difficult it can be when someone you love has—very different views than you do.”

“I just don’t want him to die,” Sans says, frustration lacing his tone. “Even if he gets better, he says he’ll just die in a few months, because of me and Papyrus. We’re taking too much soulmagic from him. I’m trying to figure out some way to let him live, but he’s not helping at all. It’s like—what? Aren’t we worth living for, you know? Why doesn’t he want to  _ try?” _

“I’m certain he wants to try,” Toriel assures him. “He promised you, did he not? But sometimes, when—when people feel very badly, it’s hard for them be helpful, or to look on the bright side of things. It’s much easier for them to feel hopeless.”

“But if he feels hopeless, than how is he ever going to get better?”

“There will be moments when he does not feel hopeless, I’m sure—if he can cling to those, he’ll make it through the worst of it. It’s hard, little one. It’s going to be very difficult for him, but I believe he can do it.”

“He’ll still die. Even if he gets better. So what’s the point?” Sans asks bleakly. “The only way to save him would be to kill me and—and Papyrus.”

The thought of Papyrus being injured, of Papyrus  _ dying,  _ fills him with such complete and utter revulsion that he recoils. Never. He could never do that—and god help anyone else who tried. 

Toriel sets a paw on his skull. “All parents die. It is the sacrifice that we make for our children, and we make it willingly.”

“It’s not fair.”

“No,” Toriel admits. “It’s not—but it is the choice your father made, when he created you. You must respect that choice.”

“But it  _ wasn’t  _ his choice. At least—at least not with Paps, not really.”

Toriel hums softly, smoothing out her robe. “Is that right? Dear, I think—I think perhaps I could help the three of you more successfully if I understood how all of this came about.”

So he tells her, as he has gotten used to telling so many people. He tell their story in numb, flat words, and she sits and listens. She cries, near the end, and he has to try very hard not to do the same—not for himself, but for Papyrus. For Dad. For their suffering, for all the  _ evil  _ in the world. The knowledge of it sticks to him like tar, black and cold and sticky. His soul aches.

Toriel goes inside to speak with Dad—well, to speak  _ at  _ him, since Sans doubts Dad will be able to communicate much of anything without Sans being there to translate. He stays outside with Papyrus and tries to coax him into the leaves. If he can just focus on that, on keeping his little brother happy, then everything feels a tiny bit better. Papyrus’ soul, tiny and gray-spattered though it is, glows just a little brighter whenever Sans tells him he’s good, or smart, or brave, so Sans keeps doing that. He’ll never ever stop, not until he can make his brother’s soul glow as brightly as his father’s used to. 

When he finally summons the courage to return to the house, Dad lays with his head cradled in Toriel’s lap. She sits in her armchair, rocking slowly next to the fire. Sans thinks of Grillby, suddenly. He misses him, painfully so. He misses his home, his bedroom with all the books, his clothes and toys and friends and Remy. More than anything, he misses what once was and what will never be again. 

He misses innocence.

Sans creeps quietly to his father’s side, studies the dried tear tracks on his cheeks. Toriel smiles gently at him, and he curls up in the crook of Dad’s elbow and keeps Papyrus cradled close to his chest. He manages to nap there, eventually, and when he wakes up his father is—reading? He’s got a book propped open on the floor, his eyes riveted to it. In the kitchen, he hears the clatter of pots and pans as Toriel prepares lunch. Papyrus’ snores emanate from underneath the armchair.

“Good nap?” Dad asks when he notices Sans watching him.

“Yeah. You?”

“Mm-hm. I’ve been thinking—I can’t alter the amount of soulmagic that I have or lose, but perhaps I can make what I have stronger, make it last longer, if I can fix this.” He gestures at the black sheen of his soul. “It might help, at least until I can figure something else out.

Sans doesn’t bother to try and hide the grin that stretches across his face. “Yeah?”

Dad bumps his snout against Sans’ skull. “Yeah, kiddo.”

* * *

That night, Sans goes to scrub down in the bathroom, along with Papyrus. He cleans his little brother first, and Papyrus accepts the touch more easily than he has before. Sans is glad to see that. After he releases Papyrus, he peels off his own clothes and lathers the washcloth with fresh soap—and then pauses, staring at the mirror. He’d noticed the black spot on his soul shortly after Dad abandoned them, but it’s nothing, compared to his father’s. The spot doesn’t seem to have grown any larger, but as he watches, the edge of it wobbles. A small glob of magic splatters down, sticks to ribs. He hastily scrubs it away. He’s fine. He’s—fine.

He pulls his shirt back over his head and tries very, very hard not to think about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> gaster youre teaching your kids bad habits goddammit
> 
> fun fact: in this form, gaster is still capable of manifesting hand bullets to sign with—but he considers it a waste of magic, and sometimes the bullets get,,,glitchy,,,like we saw during paps’ surgery. so his communication with anyone who doesn’t understand wingdings is fairly limited, which frustrates him to no end. he’s tired of people not listening to him.


	19. bone heals slowly (oh my little starsweeper)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: mentions of death/violence/torture/dead children, grief, symptoms of acute stress disorder (specifically nightmares and avoidance), injuries, gaster’s shitty coping mechanisms, brief self-harm
> 
> aaaAAAA MORE ALGERNON ART!!! [here](https://aeris-blue.tumblr.com/post/190067688335/a-pic-from-the-latest-chapter-of-parsnipit-s%22) is an adorable picture of sans, paps, and gaster done by aeris-blue! it's of the boys finally getting to!! rest and be happy at toriel’s!!! god knows they need it it u.u

“Now, that’s enough fussing,” Toriel scolds, digging another pellet out of Gaster’s shoulder. He whines, his claws scraping across the floorboards. “You’re being just a little bit dramatic.”

“It hurts,” he complains, though he knows full well she can’t understand him. It’s the tone that counts, he thinks. He supposes he could sign with a few magically-manifested hands, but what a waste of magic that would be. He’s got little enough left as it is; he can’t even hold himself together, let alone _another_ pair of hands.

“You’re not going to get any better if we can’t get these out. You’ll be getting lead poisoning and you know it.”

“Can I help?” Sans asks, climbing onto his back. “I can get the ones out of your skull.”

“Why not? May as well get the hurting all over at once,” Gaster grumbles.

Sans cheers and readily accepts the tweezers Toriel offers him, then goes to work digging around in Gaster’s skull. “Man, you really got ‘em stuck in there,” he says. “Thick skull much?”

“Well, you had to get it from somewhere, didn’t you?”

It takes another three hours to remove the rest of the pellets, but Toriel and Sans work with infinite patience. Their hands are never too rough, never too hurried or uncaring—they’re nothing like at all like Jackson’s. Gaster lays as still as he can, breathing quietly, and as a reward, Papyrus inches out from under the armchair to study him.

“Heya, Paps,” Sans says, grinning down at the child. Papyrus’ tail wags slowly as he gazes up at his big brother. “What’s up? What do you think of the old man?”

Papyrus thinks he’s a strange, enormous creature who’s become rather too fond of picking small children up in his mouth—leastways, that’s the impression Gaster gets. The child sniffs warily around him, casting him nervous little glances each time he moves, but Gaster still considers it a victory. Papyrus doesn’t normally approach him, unless there are quilts or food nearby to lure him in.

“That thing on his neck—did Jackson use it often?” he asks Sans, eyeing the concentrator near the base of Papyrus’ cervical vertebrae. 

“Yeah. Pap didn’t like it,” Sans says, sloshing hydrogen peroxide over half of Gaster’s face. It drips and sizzles between the floorboards, tickles where it runs through his eyesocket, and he shakes his head and sneezes. Papyrus, who had been sniffing his tail, freezes—but when Gaster doesn't move any further, he resumes his cautious exploration. “What is it?”

“A concentrator. I assume it infused Papyrus’ bones with DT/M50—or a concentration thereof. It will need to be removed.”

“Can you do it?”

“I’ll need to see where and what it connects to, first. If I can’t, I’m sure there’s a surgeon somewhere who can.”

“What about your collar?”

“I’ll have it removed as soon as we get back to Snowdin,” Gaster says decisively. The collar fills him with a sense of deep disgust and resentment—not to mention the fact that it’s uncomfortable as _fuck._ It chafes and pinches every time he moves his neck too far, and he loathes having his mobility restrained so. It’s beyond difficult to resist the urge to scratch at it, most times, and there are already thin gouges in his bone from his hind claws. Scratching in his sleep. He has to be.

“When is that gonna be?”

Gaster flicks his tail, and Papyrus slaps a paw at it, then stares intently at Gaster. “I suppose it should be soon. Everyone’s worried, no doubt.” A part of him dreads returning—his friends mean well, he’s sure, but there will be so much _noise,_ so much attention and color and touching and business and questions and—

“Nah,” Sans says. “I mean, I know they’re worried, but—I’d be okay with staying here for a little longer. Pap isn’t as stressed out. And, you know.” He shrugs. “Neither are you. Or me.”

“Being in Snowdin stresses you out?”

“I kind of just want to rest, right now, and I love everybody there, but…”

“No, I understand. Perhaps we can stay here for a few weeks. Would you mind asking Toriel?”

Sans nods earnestly, reaching over to tug Toriel’s sleeve. When she looks at him, he asks, “My dad wants to know if it’s okay if we stay here for a few weeks.”

“Of course it is, dear. You don’t even have to ask,” Toriel says, patting Gaster’s nose affectionately before sloshing his shoulder with peroxide. He hisses at the sting, dropping his head and scraping his paws over his nose. Papyrus backs away, but only pushes his rump against the armchair instead of darting underneath it. 

Once Gaster’s wounds have been tended to, Toriel sits back and wipes her hands off on a dishtowel before offering it to Sans. “There. Now all you need is a bath.”

“I doubt I’ll fit in the bathroom, let alone the bathtub,” Gaster says, and Sans translates as he dries his hands off.

“We’ll go to the river, then,” Toriel says, so to the river they go. Toriel packs a basket of soaps and washcloths, as well as a lunch, and Gaster convinces them all to climb onto his back.

“I may be hurt, but you all hardly weigh a thing,” he says. “It’s like transporting flies. Come on, I’m _huge._ Just get on. If I hurt, I’ll let you know right away.”

A little bit of haranguing later and they’re all on his back. Papyrus is cradled in Sans’ arms, and seems rather tentative about this whole thing, but he isn’t actively trying to get away. Gaster wasn’t lying—having the three of them on his back isn’t anything to worry about. Carrying his own weight is the only real difficulty; his joints creak, stiff from so long without extended movement, and his left leg throbs from shoulder to mutilated paw. There’s a deep, fervent ache along the upper half of his spine, spreading through both his injured and uninjured shoulder, and he can’t quite fathom _why._ As far as he knows, he bears no injury there. It’s a real nuisance. If Toriel wants him clean, though, then clean he’ll be. Cooperating is the least he can do to pay her back for her kindness.

They make their way towards the far end of Toriel’s section of the Ruins, leaping over simple puzzles rather than pausing to solve them. The wind curls crisply around them, cold and fresh from the Surface. Small monsters dart from place to place, talking merrily to each other and casting wary glances in Gaster’s direction as he passes them by. For the most part, he ignores them, although he does his best to answer Sans’ questions about them—as does Toriel. 

Within the half-hour, they reach the edge of the Ruins. The abandoned city towers in front of them, strewn with dried leaves and crumbling brick. “Woah,” Sans says.

“Welcome Home,” Toriel says. “This is where monsterkind used to live, a long time ago.”

“Why’d they leave?”

“Have you not learned that in social studies yet?”

“Nuh-uh.” Sans shakes his head. 

“Well,” Toriel says, “I wouldn’t want to spoil it for you.”

She distracts him with little tidbits of information as Gaster heads further into the city. He remembers well where the river is—he’d played there, as a child, with lots of other children from the orphanage (there had been many, in those days). It’s much shallower here than it is in Snowdin or Waterfall, albeit chillier and deeper than it is in Hotland. It runs through the heart of the city, towards the ancient watermills that used to be their sole source of power—and, even now, power what’s left of the Ruins. When he finally reaches the water, Gaster crouches on the bank and allows his passengers to clamber off and onto the ground. 

“In you get, mister,” Toriel says, and Gaster takes the plunge. The water steals his breath—it’s not frigid to him, but it’s certainly not warm, either. He shivers, digging his claws into the smooth pebbles beneath him. He ducks his head underneath the current, then lifts it out and sets it on the bank. “Now, what about those needles? We need to get them out.”

“It’ll be a good deal harder than getting the pellets out,” Gaster murmurs—a good deal harder and a good deal more painful, since they’re drilled deep into his marrow. “Leave them in for now.”

Sans sits beside his skull with a soapy washcloth and goes to work scrubbing dried marrow off of his bones, carefully cleaning around the needles. Once his skull is clean, Gaster dunks it back into the water to rinse the suds off, then clambers out on the bank and sprawls out. Sans and Toriel climb all over him, scrubbing marrow and dried black magic from his bones. Papyrus is much more interested in hiding than in anything else. He tentatively crawls towards Gaster, pausing every few seconds, until he’s wedged himself inside of Gaster’s ribcage. 

Sans pauses when he reaches Gaster’s left paw, examining the hole there carefully. It’s crusted with gray, infected magic. “Does it hurt?”

“Mm-hm.”

“I’ll be careful.” He gently scrubs the rest of Gaster’s paw clean, then rinses and re-soaps the washcloth before scrubbing inside of the hole. Gaster can’t help but flinch, and each time he does, Sans guides his paw back to the ground and gives him a second to relax before continuing. Gaster has no idea how he raised such a wonderful, patient creature, but he is so immensely grateful he did.

Once he’s been scrubbed within an inch of his life, he allows Sans to pull Papyrus out of his ribcage before he plunges back into the river to rinse. He dries out on the bank, chowing down on the lunch Toriel had so graciously packed—chips, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and two watermelons (a whole of which Gaster eats all by himself). After Sans and Papyrus have finished eating, Sans proceeds to scoop his brother up and then climb all over Gaster. The only places he avoids stepping are near Gaster’s injuries. Everywhere else seems to be fair game—including his tail.

“Son,” he says. “What on earth are you doing?”

“Systematic desensitization,” Sans says cheerfully. “So Pap knows you aren’t scary.”

“Ah. Carry on.”

Sans carries on. When they eventually get back to the house, late that afternoon, Gaster curls up near the fireplace again. His sons cuddle up in the armchair while Toriel waters her plants, and when the time comes, Sans tries his best to help Toriel prepare dinner. Gaster wants desperately to help them both, but his paws prevent him from doing just about anything useful. Even so, that evening, with clean bones, a full belly (metaphorically speaking, that is), and a warm fireplace, Gaster finds himself content. Not happy. Not better. But, for the moment, content.

“Look,” Sans says sleepily, leaning against his hip. “Your soul. That little spot looks a little bit brighter.”

Gaster glances at his soul. If the speck of white is any brighter, it’s not by much. It’s certainly not any larger—but the darkness feels a little less suffocating, right now, and he has to be satisfied with that. He sleeps for several hours, but nightmares plague him. He startles awake more than once, panting, and gives up on sleep a few hours before the lights outside brighten. He isn’t alone in his nightmares. Papyrus, too, twitches and whimpers. Gaster aches to comfort him, but knows there’s nothing he can do that wouldn’t simply frighten the child more. He can only sit, and watch, and regret a world that has tormented such an innocent creature this much.

“You should take Papyrus outside,” he suggests to Sans the next morning. “Let him stretch his legs, and then perhaps you could try some of that physical therapy Dr. Yeoman recommended with him.”

As soon as they’ve eaten breakfast, Sans is quick to take Gaster’s advice. He scoops Papyrus up, and the two of them head out to the yard. Gaster wishes fervently that he could speak to Toriel alone—she, of all people, might know how to deal with the grief of losing children who had suffered for so very much of their short lives. Unfortunately, his foolish form prevents him from doing so. (As it turns out, that is a conversation he will have much later in his life, when his wounds have grown tired and quiet and only ache on the coldest of mornings.) For now, Toriel sits and rocks in her armchair, and he snags one of her many books about snails and tries to keep his thoughts at bay through the power of reading.

“Come on, Wingdings,” Toriel says when early afternoon rolls around. “Let’s go outside. Some fresh air will do you some good.”

“Oh, yes,” Gaster says dryly. “That fresh cavern air.”

He curls up beneath the tree in the front yard and watches his children run around—which is, he has to admit, significantly more interesting than reading snail facts. Papyrus seems to have adjusted to the leaves, and he bounds gleefully into the piles when Sans calls for him. He crunches several leaves in his jaws, then makes a face and shakes his head in disgust. Sans laughs, flopping down on the ground. 

“You’re not supposed to eat them, silly,” he teases, and Papyrus huffs and pads closer to him, sniffing at his sleeves. Sans reaches out to pet his head, and this time, Papyrus doesn’t flinch. Gaster’s soul warms. His sons. His children. He is so proud of them. Despite everything, he is so glad they exist. 

Later that afternoon, Toriel concedes to dial Alphys for him. (She blatantly refuses to even _mention_ Asgore, and Grillby won’t be able to hear what Gaster can’t sign.) The phone rings, and rings, and rings, and…

“H-hello?”

“Hello, Dr. Alphys,” Gaster says, his tail wagging. _Oh,_ that is strange. He’s not sure he quite enjoys having a tail.

“Alphys, hi!” Sans says, beaming at the phone. “It’s Sans and Dad and Papyrus.”

The phoneline crackles with silence. Then, a disbelieving squeak: “Y-you’re all _okay?”_

“Yeah,” Sans says, nodding quickly, though she can’t see him. “I found my dad in the woods, and then we jumped through a wall and now we’re in the Ruins with Toriel. We’re all just fine. We’ll be home soon, so everybody can stop worrying.”

A sigh of relief. “Oh, t-thank goodness. Everyone was so scared that s-something awful had happened! W-wait—” He can practically hear her squinting. “Jumped through a wall?”

“Yeah, because that’s a thing my dad can do, apparently. Anyway, can you everybody we’re okay?” Sans asks.

“I’ll tell them r-right away. They’re going to be so happy you’re alright.”

“How have they been?” Gaster asks, and Sans translates. 

“W-well—um, not good,” Alphys admits. “Asgore and the Guard have been searching everywhere. They still h-hope they can find you. It just figures you’d be in the one place they couldn’t look. G-Grillby is, um. He’s really not h-happy. Like. R-really really not happy. The b-bar hasn’t reopened since Sans was t-taken.”

Gaster winces. 

“Well, tell him he can reopen, ‘cause I’m gonna want a hamburger when I get back, and he can’t be getting out of practice,” Sans says, grinning. 

“I-I’ll let him know,” Alphys says, giggling. “Lots of ketchup?”

“You bet.”

“And what of you?” Gaster asks. “How have you been, Alphys?”

After Sans translates, Alphys sighs. The sound is wobbly. “I—I thought you were d-dead. I know that’s what you thought would happen, if you tried to s-support another soul. Honestly, I’m, um, I’m surprised you’re n-not. Happy, that you’re not! But surprised. It was even worse to lose Sans and Papyrus, too, since they’re what you d-died for. Er—what I t-thought you died for.” 

“Well, I’m glad to announce that I haven’t died,” Gaster says, and refrains from adding _yet._ “And I assure you, both my boys have long and happy lives to live. We’ll be returning to Snowdin soon; we’ll let you know when we do. Try to keep Asgore and Grillby in line for me, won’t you?”

They talk a while longer, and then Gaster sprawls out for a nap with his sons. Sans curls up in the crook of one foreleg, and Papyrus (after some coaxing) joins him there. Gaster rests his head beside them, closes his eyes, and sleeps. This time, there are no nightmares—at least, not for him. Sans wakes up with a jolt, and his elbow greets Gaster’s nose sharply. Gaster yelps and jerks back.

“Crap! Sorry,” Sans says, patting Gaster’s snout apologetically. His chest rises and falls in sharp bursts, and his hands tremble.

“Barely a sting,” Gaster assures him, rubbing his paw over his nose until that sting fades. “Bad dream?”

Sans hesitates, then nods.

“Want to talk about it?”

“No.” Sans huddles closer to him. “I just want to forget.”

“Oh, little one. I’m afraid it isn’t so simple.” 

“Can you—” Sans wrings his hands. “Can you sing something? Like you used to?”

“A lullaby?”

Sans nods shyly. 

“Goodness, I suppose. Which one would you like?”

“The one about the stardust? That goes like—like—” Sans hums a little tune that Gaster recognizes immediately.

“Yes, I know the one.” He clears his throat, resting his head on the ground again. Papyrus stirs, stretching. His hind paws brush Gaster’s muzzle, and he cracks an eye open and regards Gaster sleepily. Gaster much, much prefers a sleepy look to a wary one. He takes a deep breath, and then begins to sing quietly. “‘La la lu, la la lu, oh my little star sweeper, I'll sweep the stardust for you…’”

Sans doesn’t sleep again, but he does drowse against Gaster, his eyes half-lidded and peaceful. Papyrus’ eyes widen when he first begins to sing, and then he watches Gaster’s mouth, rapt. 

“What?” Gaster murmurs, smiling down at him. “Have you never heard a lullaby before, little one?”

Papyrus touches Gaster’s mouth with a paw. Gaster takes this as his cue to continue, and so he does. He sings until Papyrus lapses back into sleep and Toriel comes and sits next to them.

“That was beautiful,” she says. “I didn’t know you could sing.”

“If singing is what you want to call it.” Gaster snorts. 

“I’ve no idea what you said, Wingdings, but it sounded patronizing.” She elbows him gently. “Best mind your manners.” She leans against his side, and he sighs in contentment. “You make a wonderful father. Those boys—they really love you.”

“Yeah,” Sans says, cracking an eye open. “We really do. Don’t you forget it, pops.”

“How could I ever?” Gaster murmurs, bumping his snout against Sans’ skull.

As his sons rest, he thinks about all of the other children—all of the children he failed to save, all of the children who never heard lullabies, who never felt a gentle touch or fell asleep feeling safe and secure. His soul aches for them. How is it possible to grieve so viciously for children he never met? It shouldn’t be possible—and yet, here he is, grieving himself sick.

He feels a flash of anger as his thoughts stray, too, but he smothers it as quickly as he can. Anger isn’t good. Anger isn’t safe. If he wants to get better, he can’t allow himself to be so angry anymore. (He doesn’t understand why his soul feels darker that night. He just doesn’t understand. He had a good day, he was good, _he was good and he wasn’t angry.)_

The next day, after breakfast, Sans sits with Papyrus in the living room and shows Gaster the physical therapy Dr. Yeoman told him about. He wears Papyrus out with a tug-toy, first, and then coaxes him to rest on his side. After that, he rotates Papyrus’ limbs in gentle circles, flexes and extends each joint. Papyrus noses anxiously at his hands, for the first few minutes, and then seems to relax into it. He goes limp, letting Sans move him as he will. 

“Keep him there a while, if he’s not fussing,” Gaster suggests. “Get him used to friendly touch. I doubt he’s had much of it.”

Once Sans has finished Papyrus’ physical therapy, he simply sits with him for a while, petting him—his skull, his neck, his sides, his legs, his tail. Papyrus’ eyes lid; he actually seems to be enjoying the attention, and Gaster is thrilled to see it. 

“He’s a cute one, isn’t he?” Toriel says, looking fondly at the boys. “I can’t imagine anyone hurting him.”

“Or him hurting anybody else,” Sans adds. “He’s just a big softie—huh, bro?”

Papyrus makes a low, soft clicking sound Gaster doesn’t recognize. He looks content enough, but Sans frowns when he hears it.

“What’s that look for?” Gaster asks.

“Oh—it’s just something from his training, I think,” Sans says, gently massaging one of Papyrus’ front paws. “Jackson clicker trained him, so now he clicks when he likes something. And if he doesn’t like something, he usually goes like this—” Sans draws his hand back, then taps a finger on the floor. _Tap, tap._

The change in Papyrus’ demeanor is immediate. He stiffens all over, his tail curling between his legs. He lifts one foreleg and one hindleg, showing Sans his stomach as best he can. His bones tremble. Gaster wonders exactly how he was trained into that sort of response. Gaster wonders, and he seethes, and he hates himself for his anger.

“Let’s...not make that noise,” he says.

“Yeah,” Sans says, horror in his eyes. “Let’s not. Hey—hey, Paps, it’s okay. You don’t have to be scared. I’m not gonna hurt you. I—” He clicks his teeth together. _Click._ Papyrus relaxes, panting quietly. “Yeah.” Sadness laces Sans’ voice. “Good job, Pap. You’re so good, you know that? You’re friggin’ awesome.”

Papyrus squeezes himself beneath the armchair again, and he doesn’t come out for the rest of the day.

Gaster dreams again that night—dreams of floating in solution, floating in _agony,_ dreams that his sons are dead and the bodies of rotting children swim around him. He wakes up gagging on black magic, and he stumbles outside before he disturbs the rest of the household. He retches into the leaves, then sits, groaning. His form feels so transient, so immaterial. His head throbs. 

He wipes his mouth, scraps the soiled leaves, and then sleeps beneath the tree for the rest of the night. The cool air and open space soothe him more than quilts and cramped rooms. Then Sans stumbles outside in the morning, wild-eyed and terrified, and Gaster feels like a piece of shit for leaving him alone.

That’s the day they remove the needles from his bones.

Sans sits and holds his head, and Toriel fusses with the first needle. There are four left—one in his right humerus, one in each femur, and one lodged into his lower spine. Toriel begins at his humerus. She sits just behind his shoulder, holding an icepack over the bone to numb it as best she can. When Gaster gives her the okay, she moves the icepack, grabs the needle, and _yanks._

Gaster snarls, digging his claws into the soft dirt beneath him. His head snaps up on instinct, his lower jaw scissoring angrily—Sans jumps up and hooks an arm around one of his bottom fangs, hauling his head back down with his weight. “Hey, hey, no, it’s okay,” he says, patting Gaster’s face with his little hands. “Chill, it’s okay, she’s already done.”

“No,” Gaster spits, his tail lashing, “she’s not. She still has three more.”

“Don’t think about that part.”

Gaster groans. Toriel shifts down to his hind legs, petting his hip soothingly. He snaps his jaws when she yanks the next two free, but manages not to struggle or snarl again. The one lodged into his spine proves to be a different story. The first yank Toriel gives it only pulls it halfway out—it drags against his marrow, grates against his intervertebral disc, and he _howls._ He’s up before he can think to stop himself, knocking Sans and Toriel both off and into the dirt. He whirls around, snapping at the needle on his back, as though that’s going to make it stop _hurting_. Digging his teeth into the bone around the needle proves to be a futile—indeed, even a counterintuitive—effort, but he’s driven to do it nonetheless. He chews at his spine in agitation, his sides heaving and his tail tucking at the pain. 

“Dad—hey, no no no, don’t do that.” Sans scrambles to his side, reaching up to touch his face. Gaster growls, then bites himself harder for having the _audacity_ to make any aggressive noise at his _baby._ “You’re just gonna make it worse, you’re just—hey, I said _stop!”_

Sans punches him in the nose. Gaster yowls and jerks his head back, startled. 

“Well,” Sans says. “You know what they say. Doctors make the _worst_ patients.”

“I’m not that kind of doctor,” Gaster protests meekly.

“Then stop acting like one.” Sans puts his hands on his hips, glowering. “Lay back down. Let Toriel fix it. Chewing on it’s only making it worse and you know it.”

Gaster shudders. “...it hurts.”

Sans’ face softens. He reaches up, petting just beneath Gaster’s eyesocket, his fingers brushing across the crack there. “I know, but it’s just gonna keep hurting if you don’t get it out. It’ll be quick, and then it’ll feel better. And—” He leans forward, whispering conspiratorially, “—I’ll even ask Toriel to make some fries tonight.”

“Well, now you’ve got me,” Gaster murmurs, and reluctantly lowers himself to the ground again. Toriel ices the vertebrae for a few more minutes and then, without warning, gives the needle another solid yank. Gaster snarls, kicking out with a hind leg—but within seconds the pain fades, and relief sinks into his bones. Oh, thank the stars. He slumps back to the ground, groaning. 

“There,” Sans says, patting his head. “All done. Good job, Dad.”

They have fries for dinner. Gaster feels sore but chuffed. That night, he actually _does_ think his little speck of a soul glows more brightly, and he loses no more of it. He has nightmares again, but when he jerks awake, panting, Sans startles up with him. They regard each other solemnly for a moment, and then Sans pats his shoulder and sits up.

“I gotta say,” he says softly, “I don’t think I’m much of a singer, but I’ll do what I can. What was your favorite lullaby?”

“You don’t have to—”

“I want to. C’mon, it’ll help me get back to sleep, too.”

Gaster thinks for a moment. He thinks of the songs his mother used to sing, when he was small and easily overwhelmed. Old lullabies—some sung in Common, some sung in a human language he has only the faintest remembrance of. Those are distant to him. Warm memories, but vague. He thinks, instead, on raising his own child. “Do you know the first song I sang to you?” he murmurs. “‘Baby Mine.’”

“What’s it sound like?”

Gaster hums a soft tune, and Sans’ eyes brighten.

“Yeah, I know that one. Okay, shush shush shush. My turn,” Sans says. When Gaster sets his head back down on the quilt, he snuggles back against his shoulder and begins to sing softly under his breath, “Baby mine, don't you cry. Baby mine, dry your eyes. Rest your head close to my heart, never to part, baby of mine…”

Gaster struggles to stay awake, if only to hear his son sing one more verse, one more—and when he does sleep, no nightmares come to plague him again. 

The next morning his children eat their breakfast while sitting on his ribcage—er, well, more precisely, _Sans_ sits and eats on his ribcage while Papyrus curls up in Sans’ lap and eats off of his plate. Systematic desensitization seems to be going well. The pup doesn’t even bother glancing at Gaster, unless he shifts too quickly (which he tries very hard not to do). 

“Dad?” Sans asks, swinging his legs through the gaps of Gaster’s ribs.

“Hm?”

“Can I go outside and try to solve those puzzles we saw yesterday?”

Gaster considers it—it isn’t far, and the puzzles aren’t truly dangerous. Sans could solve them easily. Then he thinks of the lasers in Hotland, of Sans’ dust spilled out beneath them, of kidnappers and murderers and sadistic scientist fucks. Anger boils in his chest, and he shudders and swallows it. It feels like swallowing tar. “I—suppose. I’ll come with you.”

They pack a lunch and head out to the puzzles. 

“Look, Paps,” Sans says, hopping off of Gaster’s back once they reach the first puzzle. “This is a puzzle. It’s something you have to solve by thinking about it—they can be pretty neat. Sometimes there are clues—like that one.”

Sans heads for the dull silver plaque on the wall, Papyrus cradled in his arms.

“Mind the spikes,” Gaster warns, curling up in the center of the room. 

“I got it, I got it, worrywart,” Sans says. “Alright—‘The far door is not an exit. It simply marks a rotation in perspective.’ That means we probably have to go through the next door, Paps, and there’ll be another clue there—another perspective. C’mon.”

Gaster ambles behind his children as they whisk through the puzzles. Sans, as he’d expected, solves them quickly. He slows only to explain things to Papyrus, or point out little clues and tips. Papyrus watches carefully, and once or twice, Gaster even sees his tail wag. They make it all the way to the entrance of the Ruins, where Sans peers up into the sunlight that seeps in from the top of Mt. Ebott. 

“That’s the Surface,” he says. Papyrus squirms and squints in the light. “That’s the sun, bro. We’ll live up there some day.”

He says it with such confidence that Gaster almost believes him. They eat lunch there, sitting on a bed of golden flowers with the sunlight pouring down on their shoulders. Sans allows Papyrus to walk most of the way back, although he always scoops him up before they reach any spikes or pits. There’s only one occasion he fails to catch Papyrus in time—the pup bounds forward near the one-switch room and topples head over heels into one of the wrong pitfalls. It’s not a long fall (barely a tumble, really), but it places him face-to-face with a vegetoid, who is remarkably unhappy about the encounter. 

“Papyrus!” Gaster lunges forward, but Sans beats him to the punch. 

“Paps, hey, buddy, it’s okay,” he says, dropping to his knees next to the pitfall. “I’m here—and _you.”_ His left eye gleams viciously yellow, and Gaster peers into the pitfall just in time to see the vegetoid glowering up at his son. “If you even think about touching him, I’ll tear you to pieces.”

The vegetoid’s eyes flicker towards Papyrus again. It is quickly and ruthlessly picked up with Sans’ magic and flung against the nearest wall. 

“I _said,”_ Sans snarls, “don’t _think about it.”_

“Sans, that’s enough,” Gaster snaps. He’s...cold, suddenly. He’s so cold. “Release it.”

Sans’ magic flickers away, and he springs down into the pitfall before Gaster can stop him. He glares one last time at the vegetoid, picks Papyrus up, and shimmies through the exit and back onto Gaster’s level. “The vegetoid started it,” he grouses, squeezing Papyrus hard enough that the pup squirms in discomfort.

“The vegetoid didn’t do anything to him,” Gaster says, stalking towards the correct pitfall. He springs down, hits the switch, and then jumps back up and continues towards Toriel’s home. “You aren’t supposed to hurt people like that.”

“People hurt _us,”_ Sans says, his voice chilled.

“So what? That means you get to turn around and start hurting others?” Gaster demands. “I thought you knew better than that.”

“No,” Sans snaps. “I’ll only hurt them if they try to hurt us.”

“The vegetoid wasn’t—”

“It might have!”

Gaster glances back at him. Sans stands in the middle of the walkway, clinging tightly to his little brother, his bones trembling. He looks furious. He looks like he’s about to cry. He looks like a five-year-old who’s just learned the world can be a cold, evil place—a five-year-old who’s just learned to bear the weight of slaughtered siblings and unwarranted agony on his shoulders, all because his father couldn’t protect him. Gaster looks away. Guilt shrouds his soul, sits heavy on his shoulders, cold and thick and unbearable. 

The weight of it is, indeed, what his very bones have cracked beneath.

“What?” Sans glowers at him. _“What?”_

Gaster shakes his head. He turns and staggers on; he feels so very heavy. Sans stomps along behind him, making a point of being angry until he grows too worried to do so any longer. He stops. Gaster pads forward a moment longer, then stops when he realizes tiny footsteps aren’t follow him.

“Hey,” Sans says. Gaster can hear the frown in his voice.

“Mm?”

“Are you...mad?”

“No. Never.”

“Yes you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Not at me?”

“Not at anyone.”

“Then why are you so quiet?”

“I’m just thinking.”

“What are you thinking about?”

“I’m thinking that I’m very sad about what happened to you, Sans. A child should never have to deal with so much fear and so much anger.”

“I’m not angry.”

Gaster shoots him a skeptical look.

“I’m _not,”_ Sans insists. He scuffs the ground with his shoe. “I just don’t want Papyrus to be hurt or scared anymore. He’s had enough of that to last him a lifetime, you know? And that vegetoid was looking really meanly at him. It wasn’t fair. He didn’t _mean_ to fall into the stupid trap.”

“I understand,” Gaster says. “But little one—you can’t hurt people just because they look meanly at someone.”

“What? I’m supposed to wait until they act on it?”

“Well, no, I just—” Gaster takes a seat outside of Toriel’s house, frowning. Sans sits down next to his paw and releases Papyrus, who curls up next to his brother’s side. “No. No, that’s not it. You’re allowed to defend yourself.”

“But only _after_ they make the first move?”

“Usually, yes, but if you have reasonable suspicion—”

“Which I _did.”_

“A mean look is not reasonable suspicion, Sans,” he says, sighing.

“Don’t sigh at me,” Sans snaps. “Vegetoids are known for being jerks. Toriel says they get into fights with other monsters all the time. Besides, it’s not like I actually hurt the thing. I just scared it. If I hadn’t attacked first, it might have—and I don’t exactly have the highest HP anymore. I can’t risk an attack from someone else.”

Gaster is struck with the distinct desire to retch into the bushes again, because that’s _his fault._ He destroyed his baby’s magic supply, he carved away Sans’ means of attack and defense and left him helpless. It’s all his fault. He can’t give it back anymore, either—he’s far too weak. The only way for Sans to get stronger right now will be for him to take from Papyrus, which Gaster already knows he’ll refuse to do. (Gaster can only hope beyond hope that his sons will grow stronger as they age. They can take everything from him. He would let them do so in heartbeat.)

“You’re right,” Gaster says, and Sans blinks at him, startled. It’s been far, far too long since Gaster’s said that to him. “You can’t take risks like that anymore. I understand why you did what you did, although I’d greatly prefer that you avoid fighting, when you can.”

“I mean—yeah.” Sans turns his hands over, studying them. “I don’t _like_ fighting, but I just—I guess I don’t know what else to do. With some people, talking just...won’t work.”

“No,” Gaster murmurs. He thinks of his mother, slaughtered in her bed by a human with a foul, bright sword. He thinks of his brothers and sisters, killed in a war he’s barely old enough to remember. He thinks of Grillby’s haunted stories, in the late hours of the night when Gaster pries just a little too much. He thinks of Jackson. “No, sometimes it doesn’t.”

“And I know you know that, because—because that’s why you created me, huh?”

Gaster looks at him, startled.

“‘s what Jackson said, anyway.” Sans shrugs. “That you created me to be a weapon. People don’t create weapons when they’re confident that talking solves all problems, y’know? Even if it’s just a distant thought, they still know that one day, fighting’s going to be the only answer they have.”

“Sans—”

“I’m not mad. I know why you didn’t tell me. You wanted me to be normal—I appreciate that, sorta.” He glances up at Gaster, remarkably calm. “Why I was created is the least of my worries, right now. Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m sorry,” Gaster says, although he’s not sure what he’s apologizing for—for ever creating Sans, or the _reason_ he created Sans, or the fact that as awful as that reason is, Sans still has worse things to consider. Numbly, he repeats, “I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Just—be more careful next time? We don’t want that project falling into another pair of wrong hands.” His laugh is bitter. It’s a noise that should never come from a five-year-old. 

“No. We don’t. I’m going to burn them all.”

“What?”

“The papers. I’m burning them all. I’ll destroy the information in the lab’s database, too. Everything Jackson and I worked on. There won’t be anything left.”

“...good,” Sans decides, simply. “I’ll help you.”

For a time, the two of them sit in silence, gazing at the warm orange glow of the windows. Gaster can almost feel the crackle of the flames in front of his bones—but it does nothing to warm him. He is chilled to his core by what he has created. Something that used to be so precious, so exciting, so _special—_ destroyed, now, abused and disregarded and made worthless. He doesn’t think he ever wants to create again. Nothing will top the high of creating life. Nothing will defeat the low of having that life torn to pieces and spat on.

“I’ll teach you to fight,” Gaster says softly. 

“You’ll _what?”_

“I’ll teach you to fight.”

Sans stares at him. “...why? I thought you didn’t want me to fight?”

“I don’t, but you’re right—sometimes fighting will be your only option, though I hope that day never comes. So I’ll teach you to fight. You deserve to be able to defend yourself if you need to.”

Sans practically quivers with excitement. “Using my magic, too?”

“Yes, using your magic, too.”

“Will I be able to do much? I mean, now that there’s not much magic left…”

“Little one, you should know better,” Gaster chides, leaning down to nudge Sans gently. “Haven’t I told you? It’s never about brute force, it’s about technique.”

“Yeah, yeah, of course—can we start now?” Sans stands, and Papyrus lies primly next to his feet. It’s a position Gaster has seen the pup fall into far too many times.

“No.”

“What? Why not?”

“It’s your naptime.” Gaster nudges him towards the house. “Go inside. Papyrus needs his sleep, and so do you. We’ll start tomorrow.”

“Promise?”

“...I promise, Sans. I’ll make you the best fighter in the Underground, and hope to the stars you never have to act like it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: i spent so long researching lullabies for this. so long. 10/10 would recommend. the lullaby gaster sings is ‘la la lu’ from lady and the tramp, and the one sans sings is ‘baby mine’ from dumbo! the lullabies gaster’s mom sang to him were all old, old, old—most of them were in the ancient monster language or in french, since gaster’s family lived in france when they were on the surface.


	20. homesick

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to physical abuse/neglect/food neglect, references to power dynamics that no child should be held to Ever, brief violence
> 
> also a note!! dominance theory (+ the usual concept of alphas and their place in the pack dynamic) is scientifically bullshit but it’s how a lot of people (re: jackson, although to a much more dramatic degree) try to train their animals, and as a result it’s become the lens through which paps views the world. an alpha wolf is just a papa, u guys, not a big bully. unfortunately, that is Not how paps has been taught to view things, hence how he interacts with gaster

134 dreams of steady Commands, a calm voice, a secure cage. Those are all very nice things to dream about. Then he dreams of The Staff, and he jolts awake, panting. He stumbles onto his feet, overwhelmed with the urge to move his bones so they rattle, rattle, rattle. Little Master snaps awake at the noise, his left eye flaring yellow and his breath hitching. 134 is intimately attuned to breath; it is the first language he learned to speak. When it stops, good things don’t happen.

He darts under the chair. Under the chair is small, and dark, and warm. It reminds him of his first home, in a room full of other small homes. He could hear his brothers and sisters when he was there. They were all around him, although they came and went. Then he was moved into his second home, which was far too big (sometimes) and far too small (sometimes) and very empty and lonely.

Well. Empty and lonely until Little Master came, anyhow.

Even now, Little Master kneels next to the chair and peers underneath it, though he keeps his distance. 134 is grateful for that. “Heya, Paps,” Little Master says. His voice is soft and gentle and like nothing 134 has known before. “Nightmare, huh? That’s okay. Nothing’s gonna hurt you here, buddy.”

Little Master vanishes for a moment, and 134 listens closely. Footsteps, towards the Food Room. The whoosh of air from the cold box, the slosh of liquid into a bowl, the beep of the small heating box. Usually, this series of noise leads to a meal—and 134 isn’t disappointed. Little Master slides a bowl underneath the chair, and 134 waits patiently for the command to eat. It never comes. It hasn’t come for quite some time. Little Master had begged him to eat, days and days ago, and 134 thought that was good enough. (He had been so _hungry,_ anything would have been good enough.)

“Go on,” Little Master says now. “It’s for you. It’ll make you feel better.”

134 thinks that’s good enough this time, too. He snaps up the pale liquid in the bowl—it’s warm, mildly sweet, smooth and rich against his teeth. It is one of his favorite thing to eat, and he gets to eat it lots and lots here. It pleases him to no end. When the bowl is empty, Little Master whisks it away again before returning. He settles down against the alpha again, curled close to his ribcage, and waves sleepily at 134. “Come join whenever you’re ready,” he says.

134 isn’t ready for a long time. When he finally edges his way out from under the armchair again, the lights outside are brightening, and he can hear Soft Master stirring in her sleeping room. He settles down next to Little Master, closes his eyes, and fades into sleep again. When he wakes a short while later, the lights outside are even brighter, and Little Master talks with the alpha in that strange, commandless language of theirs. Sometimes Little Master will speak in the Command Language, but the alpha never does. 134 supposes this is because beasts never give commands to monsters.

(Funny, then, that Little Master manages to be both.) 

The alpha glances down at him, briefly, and 134 stays very still and good. Something in that foreign language gets rumbled at him. It sounds friendly. He thumps his tail once, if only to appease the alpha, and the alpha glances away. Mission accomplished. Then Soft Master enters the room, and the alpha straightens up in respect. 134 tries to do the same, laying neatly next to the alpha, as his first Master had taught him to do. 

“Good morning, boys,” Soft Master says, her voice as soft and gentle as ever. The three of them chat above his head for a time. The alpha goes to bring in more firewood, splitting logs between his teeth before snapping them up in his jaws and stacking them next to the fireplace while Soft Master goes to work in the Food Room. They eat their first meal—134 himself gets to eat some rubbery, salty yellow scramble and a piece of crunchy bread. It’s tolerable, but he still finds himself yearning for the familiarity of the food Master gave him. 

After they eat, Little Master heads to the Cleaning Room. 134 trots after him and waits patiently as he scrubs his teeth with a brush that smells like mint. Then he dabs a bit of mint-scented gel onto his finger and offers it to 134. 134 sniffs it and leans back. Little Master dabs it onto his fangs, and 134 hesitates for a few seconds before he scrapes it off with his paw and looks uncertainly at him. Was that what he was...supposed to do…?

“Heh—hey, that’s at least a second better than yesterday,” Little Master says. “We’ll get there, huh, bro?”

It isn’t an angry tone of voice, at least.

Next, the two of them go outside, along with the alpha. 134 slinks close to Little Master’s side, his head and tail low. The world is very large and very bright, and he is very small right now. He’s been outside before, of course, but never for such long periods of time—and never without Master, who he misses very much. At least Little Master is here. That’s almost just as good (if not better, because Little Master never holds the Staff). Little Master offers him a tug rope, and 134 brightens. He knows what to do with a tug rope. He can be _good_ with a tug rope.

The two of them play tug for a time, and 134 growls happily and kicks up dust and makes a show of paying attention and participating, the way Master always wanted him to. They play a new game, too—Little Master throws the tug rope, and 134 brings it back. Little Master doesn’t click at him, but his voice does grow brighter and happier, and 134 thinks that’s about the same thing. (Although he _would_ appreciate a click. Clicks make things very clear and obvious, but no one here clicks. It’s baffling.)

When Little Master finally flops down, 134 flops down along with him. They rest a while, panting in the crisp air, while the alpha scrapes together a mound of small pebbles. 134 watches him curiously, but makes sure to glance away whenever the alpha looks his way. Prolonged eye contact is a challenge, and one 134 isn’t interested in issuing when he’s this small and the alpha is so big—perhaps when 134 is large again, he’ll make that challenge. (Or, perhaps, when he has something to challenge _for._ For a second, he glances at Little Master, and he wonders if perhaps that time isn’t too far off.)

Little Master sits up after a moment, rubbing a palm across 134’s skull. 134’s come to realize, these past few days, that Little Master’s touch is usually harmless and meaningless. It’s a funny thing. Master never hurt him, not with hands, but neither did he touch 134 without purpose. Usually, he was pushed into a position for training, or scooped up and deposited onto a table, or shoved into a cage. He was never touched like this, with this _purposelessness_. It’s...okay, he supposes, even if he doesn’t enjoy it. It makes Little Master’s voice sound happy again, at least.

For a few minutes, Little Master moves 134’s limbs for him. 134 goes limp, as he’s learned to do, and lets it happen. That’s the easiest way to do these things. After all, struggling is ineffective and, more often than not, results in the Staff. Little Master hasn’t had to use the Staff on him yet, and 134 hopes desperately he can keep it that way. After Little Master stops fussing with his limbs, he takes to simply petting 134’s bones—his spine (oh, he doesn’t like that), his ribs, his legs and jaw. It’s odd. It makes him twitchy, at first, but as Little Master’s touch grows firmer, he grows more relaxed. Sleepy, almost. He yawns. 

“You can nap, buddy,” Little Master says, scratching beneath his chin. “It’s okay. We won’t let anything happen to you.”

Strangely enough, 134 believes him. Nothing truly bad has happened since Little Master walked with him into the snowy forest. 134 closes his eyes, and he rests, even if he can’t quite lapse into sleep. 

When he opens his eyes again, Little Master and the alpha are doing...something. 134 sits up, cocking his head. The alpha appears to be throwing pebbles at Little Master. What an odd thing for a beast to do to a master. Little Master, meanwhile, tries desperately to dodge the pebbles. He’s failing, more often than not. 

“I don’t,” Little Master wheezes at one point, bracing his hands on his knees, “understand how this is supposed to help me fight.”

134 struggles to understand the alpha’s response, but he thinks he catches one or two words. “Like you said, you don’t have HP to spare, Sans. You need to avoid getting hit if you’re ever going to have the chance to land a blow. Your ability to dodge will be more important than your ability to attack.”

“Isn’t dodging kinda—I don’t know, cowardly?”

“It’s the cowards who survive, little one.” The alpha shakes himself off. “The cowards and the lucky.”

“Which one are you?”

The alpha grimaces. “I think you can figure that out.”

“I don’t think you’re right.”

“You rarely do, anymore.”

Little Master shrugs. “I mean, lots of people survive war—moms and dads, kids and doctors, accountants and bakers. Not all of those people are cowards, you know what I mean? And not all of them are lucky, either. They just have different priorities.”

“Hm.” The alpha cocks his head. There’s a fond gleam in his eyes. “Your critical thinking skills are improving.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” The alpha whacks another pebble with his tail, and it bounces off of Little Master’s skull. “But your dodging skills aren’t. Back to work, kid.”

134 has learned patience from a very young age, but usually not with so many distractions around. The click of the pebbles against the ground is tempting, and he finds himself edging forward before long. He takes one into his mouth and backs away again, settling down to chew on it. The pressure feels good against his teeth. 

Some time after Little Master and the alpha have ceased flinging pebbles at each other, they eat their second meal. 134 isn’t really hungry yet—he’s quite used to two meals a day—but he knows better than to waste food. (Most of the time, he got two meals, but sometimes—sometimes Master wouldn’t come back for days, or he’d forget a meal, or two, or...three, or….)

So 134 eats everything he’s given, even if it leaves him feeling overly full and uncomfortable, even if it’s too strong, too salty, too sweet, and it makes him grimace and scrape his paws over his teeth. Fortunately, that’s not the case today. Today, he eats plain brown rice and soft vegetables. After that, he and Little Master duck outside again. Little Master sets him down in the pile of leaves beneath the tree and just talks to him. As he talks, he makes strange little movements with his hands.

“This is Hands,” he’d explained once, days ago. “It’s another language you’ll need to learn to speak, because some monsters can’t talk very well, like Dad. So when Dad’s back to normal, this is how he’ll talk to other monsters, most of the time. And he _is_ going to get back to normal.” Little Master’s face had set, stubborn, his hands balling up into determined little fists. “I’ll make sure of it.”

He wonders who Dad is, and why Little Master is so determined to help him. Dad must be someone wonderful.

Now, 134 sits and studies Little Master’s hands as he speaks. He wishes he could move his own paws that way, but they simply weren’t built for such things. On occasion, Little Master will try to coax him into speaking with his voice. 134 doesn’t quite understand why, but it makes Little Master happy, so he tries, sometimes. Mostly he fails, but Little Master never goes to get the Staff, not ever. 134 is very grateful for that.

“Can you say hi?” Little Master asks, looking hopefully at him. “Hi, Papyrus?”

“Hh,” 134 tries.

“Hiiiii.”

“Hhhhhh.”

“C’mon, I know you can make the ‘i’ sound. What about good night? Good night, Papyrus.”

“Ni,” 134 says, his tail wagging briefly. He knows that one. 

“Good job, Paps!” Little Master cheers, reaching out to rub his skull affectionately. 134 hesitates, then leans into the touch, just a little bit. Little Master’s eyes shine. “Okay, okay, now just add the ‘h’ onto the front. _Hiiii.”_

“Hi.”

“Yes!” Little Master beams, knocking their skulls together and giggling. “Yes, just like that, bro. You’re so friggin’ smart. I knew you would be.” He winks. “You’re my little brother, after all. Okay, now what about, uuuh—Sans? Can you say Sans?”

134 stares at him.

“Sssss,” Little Master says, pressing his teeth together. “Go sssss.”

“Sssss.”

“There you go, you’ve got it. How about aaaaannn?”

“Aaaa.”

“No, no, short ‘a’ sound, like pans or dams or trams.”

“Ams.”

“Pans?”

“Ppp.”

Little Master laughs and flops back into the leaves, rubbing his face. “Okay, okay, maybe next time.”

134 crunches the leaves between his teeth, stretching out on his belly and flexing his claws. It takes a bit of shifting to get comfortable, to find a spot in which his spine _doesn’t_ ache, but he manages it eventually, and then the two of them lay quietly. The air is crisp and cool, and the leaves rustle gently around them. Farther away from the house, he can hear the hopping of froggits and the soft murmurs of whimsums. A part of him wants to go and meet them, to see if they’re as kind as Little Master is, to see what games they know and what things they can teach him. Another (larger) part of him is too afraid to do so—and there’s nothing in the world that could get him to leave his master’s side, anyhow. Nothing but a Command, that is.

That evening, they curl up by the fireplace. 134 huddles under the armchair to recuperate from so many sights and sounds and textures, and his masters mercifully leave him be until it’s time for their third meal. He eats what he’s given—shredded meat (the closest thing he gets to his first master’s meals) and some kind of mildly sweet fruit. 

“Apple,” Little Master tells him. “This is an apple.”

“Can he talk?” the alpha asks. 

“Uuuh—he can babble, a little bit, in Wingdings.”

“You should be teaching him normal Common.”

“He doesn’t like normal Common. It’s what Jackson spoke. He always gets tense when I talk to him like that,” Little Master says, leaning back against the alpha’s side. “Besides, this way he can understand both of us and not just me. I’ll teach him normal Common when he’s older; it’s not a hard transition. It’s just a different pronunciation.”

The alpha sighs and sets his head down in front of the fireplace, the flames casting an orange gleam across his snout. “Very well.”

Before it’s time to sleep, Little Master takes him back to the Cleaning Room. He dabs more mint paste onto 134’s teeth, and 134 makes a face but doesn’t scrape it off. Little Master’s eyes shine, and he kneels in front of 134 with a small new brush. He attempts to scrub it across 134’s teeth, which feels massively strangely. 134 ducks his head and paws his muzzle, and Little Master laughs and relents.

Once Little Master’s teeth are brushed, he carefully runs a warm, sweetly-scented cloth across 134’s bones. 134 tolerates the process, standing as still as he can. When Little Master is finished, he opens the door and releases 134. 134 heads straight for the dark space under the armchair, edging gingerly past Soft Master’s fuzzy legs to get there. She allows this, as she always does.

Then the quilts get brought out. 134 _loves_ the quilts. They’re soft and warm and plush, and very very good to laze about on. They make his bones ache less and shield him from the chill, and when he wakes after sleeping on them, his spine doesn’t feel so very stiff. They’re even worth approaching the alpha for, so once they’re in place he creeps out from under the armchair and cuddles up on the far edge of the quilt. Little Master curls up between him and the alpha, to 134’s relief. Together, the three of them sleep.

134 dreams of Master. It’s not a bad dream. He misses his home very, very much—but when he thinks about leaving this place and returning, something curdles, sour and sharp, in his chest. 

When he wakes up, he decides to take a risk. Little Master and the alpha fold the quilts up, which leaves him with nowhere comfy to rest. He eyes the armchair jealously. It looks vaguely like the quilt—leastways, the lining does—and he bets it would be very comfortable. Soft Master isn’t using it right now, anyway, and Little Master has sat there with 134 before, so he knows they’re allowed up. (At least, he knows he’s allowed up when Little Master is there. Perhaps, if he’s lucky, Little Master will join him soon.)

He springs up and into the armchair, although it sends a jolt of pain through his spine to do so. Fortunately, the chair is as blissfully soft and warm as he had expected, and he sighs in pure contentment. Little Master elbows the alpha, who glances briefly in his direction. 134 tenses—surely the alpha will want the warmest, softest spot in the house. Surely he won’t allow 134 to remain here for very long. 

The alpha glances away again. Huh.

134 relaxes for the briefest of moments, and then goes rigid when he realizes Soft Master is returning. She glances down at him, and her eyes widen. He begins to pant in anxiety. The Staff. He doesn’t want her to get the Staff. Oh, please, don’t let her get the Staff, please please please he’ll be good he’ll be so good—he rolls over preemptively, showing her his belly, and her eyes soften. Good. That must have been the right thing to do, right? He must have been good, right? _Right?_

“Hello there, dear one,” Soft Master says. He clamps his tail between his legs, trembling, but she doesn’t sound angry—not yet, not yet. “I see you’ve found the comfiest spot in the house. Do you mind if I sit with you?”

Little Master sits up straight, and 134 sees the tension in his shoulders. 134 begins to pant more rapidly. He wants nothing more than to get up and bolt, but that might upset Soft Master, so he stays very still. Why won’t they give him a Command? Why won’t they just tell him what they want from him? Why don’t they tell him how he can be _good?_

“Maybe you shouldn’t,” Little Master says. The alpha lifts his head, and his eyes find 134 again. “He’s scared.”

“Yes, he is,” Soft Master says, and kneels in front of the chair, bringing herself down to 134’s level. That’s...slightly less intimidating. “And I want to teach him not to be, Sans. Let me try this, hm? I promise if he’s still this frightened in a few moments, I’ll let him go right away. Is that fair?”

Little Master squirms with discomfort, then glances up at the alpha.

“What are you going to do?” the alpha asks.

Soft Master winks and says, “Systematic desensitization.” 

The alpha chuckles and sets his head down again. Little Master sighs and sits back down. “Alright,” Little Master says grudgingly. “You can try, but if he gets scared, you gotta let him go.”

“I promise,” Soft Master says. “Scaring him is the last thing I want to do. Could you bring me a bottle of milk, Sans, and a bowl of chicken?”

Little Master leaves the room, and then Soft Master reaches down and picks 134 up. 134 stiffens. He loathes being picked up, although he’s gotten used to it since being around Little Master. In this place, it seems that being picked up doesn’t always result in being placed on a surgery table or inside of a testing room—not yet, anyhow. Soft Master takes a seat in the armchair and settles 134 next to her. 

Little Master returns with a bowl of something that smells like warm meat, and 134 lays very still and doesn’t look at it. It isn’t for him. He’s never fed outside of his cage—or, as of the last few days, when he’s out from underneath the armchair. Soft Master sets the bowl on her knee, places the bottle next to her leg, and then begins talking softly with the alpha and Little Master.

For a time, that’s all they do. The three of them talk, and 134 lays still and quiet and trembles—but Soft Master never moves him, never touches him, never goes to get the Staff or the bonesaw or the needles or the chain. She just...sits there, and lets 134 lay next to her, close enough that he can feel the warm weight of her leg against his ribs. 

The bowl of meat really does smell good. He lifts his head, sniffs the air. He wonders when the alpha or the masters are going to eat it, but none of them make a move towards it. After a few more minutes, Soft Master picks up a piece of the meat—he expects her to eat it, but she sets it down in front of him, instead. He cringes away, and she moves her hand back. The meat remains. He struggles not to lean towards it, snuffling the air.

“It’s alright,” Soft Master murmurs, still not looking at him. “You can eat.”

 _Eat._ He recognizes that word—a Command. He snaps up the bite of meat and then lays back again, calmer now that he’s followed a clear directive. He’s been good. Surely they won’t hurt him for that? 

Soft Master sets another piece of meat in front of him. He waits expectantly for the Command, staring hard at the food. “What’s the matter?” Soft Master asks. “It’s alright. It’s yours. You can keep eating.”

134 wolfs up the next bite of meat. 

“Don’t say that word,” Little Master says, suddenly. “Eat. It’s a command. If he’s going to take something from you, I don’t want it to be because you told him to.”

Soft Master hesitates, a pained looking flashing across her face, before she nods. “Very well. Here you are, Papyrus.” She sets another piece of meat in front of him. “When you’re ready.”

134 waits a long, long time for a Command that never comes. His masters watch him sadly, and he feels awful about it. He wants to be good. Why don’t they just tell him how to be good? Why does he have to figure it all out on his own? He lays his head on his paws and he stares at the meat and he feels terribly homesick.

Little Master picks up the meat and pops it into his mouth—then he picks up another piece of meat and offers it to 134. He doesn’t _look_ at 134, nor does he speak to him. Instead, he keeps up an amiable conversation as he waits. It’s...easier to take food from Little Master. He’s done it before, without a direct command. Cautiously, he does it now. As soon as he eats the meat, Little Master beams at him.

“Good job, little one,” Soft Master croons gently. She sounds pleased, and it makes his chest warm. “Very good job.”

Little Master feeds him bite after bite, and both masters praise him. He is quite pleased by this discovery. When Soft Master offers him a bite, he hesitates, then gingerly takes it from her. The praise continues. He could practically preen. Little Master offers him the bottle, and he fastens his teeth to it and sucks—he’s learned that this is much easier (and much less messy) than trying to chew the top off, though it still feels odd. 

When the bottle gets handed to Soft Master, he pauses. Little Master murmurs soothingly to him, and he continues to suckle, albeit more slowly. The chair rocks back and forth, back and forth, a comforting lull. The firelight crackles and gleams. He studies the aimless shadows on the wall, and his eyes begin to feel heavy. He eventually falls asleep there, sprawled next to Soft Master, full and warm and content.

When he wakes up, he’s still in the armchair, and the lights outside are dark. Soft Master is gone, but there’s a soft quilt draped over him. The fire dies slowly, embers crackling and sparking. The alpha snoozes on the floor in front of him, ribs rising and falling slowly. He stirs briefly in his sleep, his hind paw coming up to scratch talons across his neck. His soul looks different. Ordinarily, it’s black and greasy and discomfiting. Tonight, it seems...a little brighter. Not much, but a little. 

134 finds that this unnerves him.

He sets his head back down and closes his eyes, but he doesn’t sleep again.

The next morning, Little Master helps Soft Master make their first meal. 134 sniffs around the cold box—pauses, waits for a click or a tap, and then, when neither comes, he continues. He sniffs the cold box and the big heating box, the cabinets and the sink. He’s cautious when it comes to weaving around his masters’ ankles, but neither of them kicks him or pushes him away. They’re such kind masters. He is so glad to have them.

Soft Master reaches down, once, but she only pets his skull briefly. He shrinks away, and she lets him go. He hides under the table for a time, watching as his masters cook. Little Master feeds him the first meal by hand, then settles down next to the alpha’s paw. He fusses over it, smearing something inside of the hole there. It smells like disinfectant—like medicine, like injuries, like his first home, and 134 tucks his tail and huddles beneath the armchair again. 

How unpleasant, to be reminded of such things here, in this good place.

That afternoon, once the medicinal smell has faded from the room, Little Master coaxes him out from under the chair and reads him books from Soft Master’s bookshelf. 134 only understands a little of what he says—he reads in that odd commandless language, most of the time—but that’s okay. He likes the lull and cadence of Little Master’s voice; it’s familiar, comforting. 

That evening, Soft Master picks him up and sets him in the armchair with her again. He eats his dinner there, soothed by the gentle rocking and the firelight. It doesn’t feel quite as secure as his space _under_ the armchair, but it’s not bad, either. The alpha watches him quietly for a moment, head tilted.

“You know,” he says, “I had to do something like that with you, Sans.”

“Did you?” Little Master asks. 

“Mm-hm. When you were very little, you didn’t want to come out of the DT/M50 solution we had you in. I took to feeding you breakfast when you were outside of the solution—you grew to associate the outside world with food.”

“So I started liking it?”

“You did. There’s a human who studied that—Ivan Pavlov. He did an experiment involving dogs—”

“Papyrus isn’t a dog.”

“I know, I know. The same basic principle applies to most intelligent species. Anyhow, he…” The alpha goes on to explain some sort of odd experiment, and Little Master listens to him, rapt. It’s another odd thing about Little Master; he actually listens to his beasts. 134’s first Master never did that. He’s starting to realize that perhaps all masters aren’t the same.

Before they sleep, Little Master takes him to the cleaning room. As per usual, 134 gets wiped down with a soapy washcloth, then has strange minty gel dabbed onto his teeth. When Little Master scrubs the brush across his teeth, he tries to sit still. It doesn’t _hurt,_ really, it just feels extremely odd. He tolerates the brush across his front teeth, but when Little Master angles it towards his molars, he whines and leans back. Little Master lets him go without a fuss, beaming.

“Great job, buddy. You’re learning fast,” he says, scrubbing his own teeth clean with another brush. 134 thumps his tail once, scooting closer and leaning carefully against Little Master’s legs. Little Master grins through a mouthful of foam—grins so wide his eyes squeeze shut. 134’s tail thumps again. What wouldn’t he do to make his master that happy all the time?

That night, he curls up in the armchair and watches quietly as Little Master lays down next to the alpha instead of 134, despite 134 having a much comfier spot ready for him. He bristles some when the alpha nuzzles against Little Master’s skull, a flash of possessiveness rearing its head beneath his sternum. What right does the alpha have to touch _134’s_ master so freely? Why does Little Master always sleep next to the alpha, instead of next to 134, here on the armchair where it’s warm and soft? It isn’t fair.

When the alpha looks his way, 134 meets his eyes and doesn’t glance away, this time.

“What’s the matter, little one?” the alpha rumbles softly. Little Master stirs but doesn’t wake, and the alpha glances fondly at him. “What’s that look for?”

134 decides then that he would fight the alpha, for his Little Master. He would lose, against such a large creature, but he would fight. He straightens his tail, stiffens his legs, puffs out his chest. He remembers what it was like to be big—to be as big as the alpha and bigger, bigger, _bigger._ Let the alpha force him to submit. _Let him try._ Whatever he does, it can’t possibly be as bad as a master’s fury. It can’t be as bad as the Staff. 

There isn’t a beast on this earth as bad as the Staff.

“No,” the alpha murmurs. “No, I don’t think so.”

Then he—then he—he rolls onto his back and shows 134 his belly. 

134 stares at him.

“My.” The alpha hums softly. “This isn’t a comfortable position, is it? It feels terribly vulnerable. Anyone around you could hurt you, and you’d be hard-pressed to defend yourself. I imagine it isn’t a position you’d take willingly around Jackson. He forced you into it, didn’t he? What he did to you—I can’t fathom it, Papyrus. But you can rest assured that I’ll never do that—” In the depths of the alpha’s eyes, dull purple light swirls. “—and I’ll slaughter the next person who tries.”

134 doesn’t understand most of what the alpha says, but his tone is soft and his body is loose. 134 springs down from the armchair, inching closer to him. No one has ever submitted to him before. He certainly didn’t expect it to be that easy. He expected it to be a fight—he expected teeth and claws and brutal pain. That’s what submission is, isn’t it? Something to be fought for, something to be forced. 

...so why isn’t the alpha fighting?

134 hesitates a few inches away from him, leaning forward and snuffling his cheek. The alpha smells like stale bone, like sickness and sadness and rot. (Little Master smells like that, sometimes, too. It is a scent they all share.) He closes his eyes as 134 sniffs him, sighing softly. 134 dares to inch even closer, brushing his muzzle along the alpha’s snout, his eyesocket, the cracks in his skull. Then he does the only thing that makes sense—

He bites.

The second his teeth dig into the alpha’s snout, the alpha’s eyes snap open and he stiffens. 134 tenses, tightens his grip, prepares to be shaken or grabbed or struck—but nothing happens. The alpha lays still. What? Does he not understand what 134 wants from him? Perhaps he should make it a little _clearer._ He bristles up the spikes on his back, despite the deep ache it drives through his spine, and begins to growl.

Little Master’s eyes snap open. “Dad?”

“Shh, Sans,” the alpha murmurs. 134 freezes. Will his master be mad at him for fighting? 134 doesn’t _think_ so, but then—well, he’s never fought another blaster around Little Master, although of course he had done so for Master. He doesn’t know the proper protocol now, but he assumes this is it. His first Master always wanted him to be strong and vicious and unflinchingly obedient, so 134 pays close attention to Little Master’s voice. He’ll release the alpha the second he’s told to do so, but until then, he’ll prove to his master he’s no _coward._

That, or the alpha will kill him and he won’t have to worry about it anymore.

“What are you doing?” Little Master sounds frightened. 134’s growl rackets up a notch; how dare the alpha scare their master, _how dare he._ “Papyrus…?”

“It’s alright. Barely a sting; let me deal with it.”

Little Master starts to sit up, but—

“Stop,” the alpha murmurs. Little Master obeys. Why is...Little Master obeying a beast…? “Stay down. I want him to pay attention to me, right now.”

Little Master snakes an arm through the alpha’s ribs, but otherwise, he holds still and falls silent. 134 trembles in the quiet. No Commands, no structure, no focus. Just him. Just his will, his decisions, his own intuition. It’s a terrible thing, and he feels very alone. He lashes his tail; perhaps if he acts angrily enough, his fury will replace his fear. 

“Papyrus,” the alpha says, and 134 trembles. It is the name by which they call him; he recognizes this, by now, though he does not lay claim to it. It will be sure to change, when he’s returned to his first Master. “It’s alright. You don’t need to fight anymore; that isn’t how we do things, here.”

His tone is infuriatingly calm. He should be snarling, growling, snapping his teeth. _That’s_ how these dilemmas are solved, and 134 is sick of not knowing his place. Why doesn’t the alpha act like an alpha, already, or just let 134 do it? A snarl begins to roll in 134’s chest, and he digs his claws into the floorboards. They leave gouges. He is made of daggers and knives and all things sharp and evil.

“Very well,” the alpha says, and rolls onto his feet. 134’s eyes widen, and he bears down with his teeth, trying desperately not to fall to the ground. Then the alpha gives his head a solid _shake,_ and 134’s teeth scrape across bone and jostle free. He twists midair to land on his feet, but enormous jaws close around him before he hits the ground. He shudders, waiting for those jaws to clamp down, to crush his bones, but they never do. Instead, the alpha keeps his jaws loose and his mouth soft, and he carries 134 outside. He places 134 on the ground, then sits back and curls his tail around his paws.

134 stares at him. What is he supposed to do? The alpha isn’t posturing either way—he isn’t acting aggressively or defensively. Ordinarily, that means 134’s free to do what he wants, but—but how can that be? 134 just challenged him! They’re supposed to fight, they’re supposed to hurt each other! That’s all beasts are built for. 134 digs his claws into the ground, bristles up, and tries again. 

The alpha more or less ignores his posturing. He doesn’t return it, and he doesn’t submit again. Instead, he cocks his head. “You don’t need to do that,” he says. “I’m not going to fight you, little one, but I’m not going to let you hurt me, either.”

134 bares his teeth, his growl clicking its way from his chest to his jaws. He taps his claws on the ground. _Tap, tap. Tap, tap. Tap, tap._

The alpha doesn’t look the slightest bit frightened. How can he be so nonchalant? Doesn’t he fear the tapping? The Staff? Doesn’t a clear warning mean anything to him? Why is he so _strange?_ “Ah, Papyrus.” The alpha sighs softly. “You make me so sad.”

134 loathes the pity in his voice. He’s nothing to _pity._ He’s a beast, a weapon, and a very good one, at that. Pity is the last thing he wants. He snarls, snapping his jaws together, as blatant a threat display as he can make. When the alpha still doesn’t respond, he lunges forward, intent on sinking his teeth into the alpha’s injured paw. Let him ignore _that._

The alpha lifts his paw, and 134 skids to a stop beneath him. He cringes, waits for the paw to come down and slam him into the ground, but it never does. His confusion boils over, feeds his fury, and he lunges at the alpha’s other front paw. It, too, lifts off of the ground. The alpha balances easily on his haunches, peering down at 134. 134 glares as best he can. His Master has done this before—luring 134 along with human-scented cloth, training him to pursue, pursue, pursue. He can do this for _hours._

And so he does.

He snaps his teeth at the alpha’s hind feet, and the alpha drops his front feet to the ground again and sidesteps him. He springs at the alpha’s tail and finds it whisked out of his reach. He tries to lunge up, to get the alpha’s ribs between his teeth, but he’s too small for that. He manages to turn the alpha’s soul blue, but he can’t do anything more than stumble the alpha back a few inches. He’s reduced to snapping at the alpha’s heels and nothing more, and he’s enraged by it. He wishes he were bigger again; who cares about the pain of growing? 

He’d give anything just to be able to _fight_ the way he’s meant to.

By the time he staggers to a stop, panting, the lights above them are growing brighter. Little Master peers out of the window; there are heavy, sleepless bags under his eyes. Shame burns through 134’s bones. His master has watched him struggle and fail, and fail, and fail. Perhaps that’s why the alpha is the alpha—he doesn’t even have to _try_ and he makes everyone else look like a fool.

The worst part of it, though, is that 134 feels _guilty._ He’s never felt guilty about hurting something before. He’s never felt guilty about fighting, about doing what he was told to do. But ever since they put that _soul_ inside of him—he snarls, staggering on his paws. His ribs heave. White magic froths and drips from his teeth.

The alpha regards him quietly. “Tired, aren’t you? Why don’t we go inside and rest? Your armchair must miss you.”

134 _hates_ him. He didn’t ask for any of this. He just wants to go back home! He just wants to go back to a time when things made sense, when he knew what he was and what he was supposed to do. He wants Commands, he wants to be big and fierce, he wants the security of his cage and his normal meals and his training. He just wants to be good again. He just wants to be _good._

His eyes prickle and sting. Tears splatter on the ground beneath him, and his breath shudders.

“Oh, my little one.” The alpha—no. No, that’s not right. He isn’t an alpha. 134 doesn’t even think he’s a beast, really. So what is he? The—the creature pads slowly towards him, gives him time to move away. 134 doesn’t need to. He won’t be attacked, not even if he wants to be. The creature lays down, curls up around him but leaves a gap between his tail and his muzzle so 134 can escape. 134 doesn’t bother. “Shhh, hush, now, it’s alright. We’re okay.”

134 chokes on a sob, his head drooping. His nose brushes the dirt. His tail hangs low. He feels so very miserable—so confused, so sad and lost and homesick. He doesn’t know what to do. He _doesn’t know what to do._

“Shh-shh-shh.” The creature squirms closer, touches his nose to 134’s head. 134 flinches on instinct, but no pain comes. “I’m here, Papyrus. Dad’s right here.”

Dad. That creature that Little Master speaks so highly of—Dad. Is this Little Master’s dad? It seems impossible. Why would a master adore a beast so much? This creature must be something very special, indeed, to hold the title of Dad. 134 is...jealous, almost. He’s not sure whether he’s jealous that Little Master adores this creature so much, or that the creature is so very respected. Perhaps it’s a little of both.

“I’m never going to let anything hurt you again,” the creature—Dad—murmurs. “It’s okay to be sad, or scared—this is a big, new place, after all. You can cry if you need to; it might even make you feel better. But I’m here, and I won’t leave you alone. I’ll keep you safe from now on.”

134’s bones shudder, and his haunches buckle under him. He sits, his shoulders hunched, his tail curled tightly around his paws, and he sobs. Dad curls closer to him, sets his head in front of 134 and croons softly to him. A rumble starts in Dad’s chest, but it quickly morphs into something else—a low, crooked purr. 134’s...never heard a purr before. It’s an old sound, one that touches the primitive part of his mind and assures him that everything is okay, that he’s safe and cared for and—and loved.

He cries even harder.

It feels good, in a way, expelling all of the awful emotions that have curdled in his chest since he left his Master. In another way, it feels absolutely awful. He’s tired and frustrated and confused and he doesn’t know if he’s ever going to stop feeling that way and he has no idea how to communicate that. He wishes, for one of the first times, that he knew how to talk the way real monsters do.

He scoots forward and, in a moment of daring, touches his nose to Dad’s muzzle. This time, he doesn’t bite. Dad’s eyes close, and his purr swells and fades with his breathing. 134 huddles closer to him. Comfort, he realizes. Dad doesn’t bring pain or fear or aggression—he brings comfort, he brings soothing purrs and gentle nuzzles and calm voices. He reminds 134 very much of Little Master.

“Papyrus,” Dad murmurs. Maybe it’s...not so bad, claiming that name, if such gentle creatures call him by it. “Papyrus, my little one, my baby boy, my Papyrus. You don’t have to fight anymore. I’ll fight for you, from now on. I’ll do everything I have to to keep you safe—you and your brother. No one is ever going to hurt you again.”

Papyrus curls up close to Dad’s muzzle and tries very, very hard to believe him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: more on the ‘dominance theory is bullshit’ thing!! the whole ‘dominance theory’ came about because some guy observed some wolves in captivity. in that case, the wolves did have a lot of infighting, and the two who won the most fights this guy dubbed the alphas. however, the application of those dynamics to wolves in the wild is completely wrong. in the wild, where wolves aren’t shoved into a tiny space and forced to interact with other strange adults, their packs are merely families. the ‘alphas’ are just mama and papa wolves, and all the other wolves are their children. occasionally packs will have unrelated members, but that’s not as common. anyways, as you can imagine, the alpha wolves do decide what and when the pack does things because everyone else in the pack is a literal baby. it’s kind of like calling a human mom the ‘alpha female’ just because she’s in charge of her kids. an alpha is not someone who bullies everyone else into submission. most submission is freely given, it’s fluid (so there’s no ‘omega wolf’) and it’s simply a form of communication. thus the whole training method of ‘humans have to Dominate their dogs and force them into submission’ is gross and only works bc dogs get scared of the people 'dominating’ them. anyway. i have strong feelings about that but i will Stop now.


	21. there are no masters here

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: graphic child abuse, violence, severe injuries, panic attack/flashbacks**
> 
> this one’s a dark one, folks, because we dip a little more into papyrus’ past. proceed with caution.
> 
> also [here](https://a-big-chicken-nerd.tumblr.com/post/190535645557/parsnipit-here-u-go-jackson-you-fricking-frik-im) is some algernon memery for all of your algernon memery needs.

In the end, they stay with Toriel for almost a month. It’s good, Gaster thinks. The three of them needed time to recover away from the hustle and company of Snowdin. Papyrus especially—Gaster hates to think of how he’ll react to so many strangers once they return to the whole of the Underground. Gaster misses his friends terribly, but at the same time, it’s a relief to be away from them. There’s no pressure to act a certain way, no demands on his emotions (save, of course, those that his sons make). He feels like an awful friend, but he’s glad to have a break from them—from everyone. He’s glad to have a chance to just _be._

Out here, in the Ruins, he’s free to do whatever he wants. He doesn’t have to think about Jackson, about the statements and evidence he’ll be expected to provide, about the Judgement that will inevitably take place, about those necessary evils he’s planning to commit after the Judgement. He doesn’t have to think about shopping, about socializing Papyrus, about setting up therapy for his boys, about working in the lab and hating every moment of it. He doesn’t have to think about being separated from his children for work, about Sans’ return to kindergarten, about telling the same awful story over and over again. 

Out here, he just has to think about collecting firewood, about making little repairs to Toriel’s house, about swimming in the river and eating warm food and basking in front of the fireplace. He has to think about keeping his sons clean and well-fed, about soothing them through the worst of their nightmares and fears and furies. That’s it. That’s all that matters.

Stars, he really is a coward, isn’t he?

Slowly, slowly, his cowardly soul heals. By the end of the month, it’s more gray than it is black. Sans looks thrilled every time he sees it, and Gaster has to admit that he feels more comfortable. He isn’t sick with fear anymore, he isn’t thinking constantly about what was abused and beaten and lost (although he knows those thoughts will never be far from his mind). He can ignore his guilt, most days, although it never completely vanishes, and he doubts it ever will. His nightmares are steady and constant, but quickly forgotten in the light of day. 

The anger, though? The anger never _stops,_ no matter how hard he tries to ignore it. He knows there’s only one thing he can do to rid himself of it, and when he thinks on that very thing, his magic churns with a morbid blend of excitement and terror—but his feelings on the subject don’t matter. What must be done must be done. (And if he takes pleasure in the doing? Well, then, that’s a bonus.)

His body, too, has healed—most of it, leastways. The deep holes in his bones, created by the shotgun pellets, have rounded out into shallow indentations. The thin fractures left by the IO needles have mended, although the cracks from his form-breaking remain. He doubts those will ever fade; he simply doesn’t have enough magic to maintain a full form, any longer. The collar around his neck remains a constant irritation, and he’s eager to have it removed (though he dreads going through another surgery). Meanwhile, the infection in his left paw has all but vanished, and his limp only makes itself known if he’s been walking for too long. Most of his bones don’t ache any longer; he’s settled into this shape, and it isn’t as disconcerting as it once was. Even so, he longs for his smaller form. Communication as a blaster is an issue, although he does have slightly more magic to spare for signing, now. He’s considered learning Morse, but with Papyrus’ aversion to tapping…

Well, that plan was quickly scrapped. He’ll have to figure something else out.

The only part of him seems to have gotten physically worse is his goddamn _shoulders._ They ache more often than not, and they cramp and sting if he moves the wrong way. Once, they’d gone into a spasm that left him immobile and gasping for minutes—he dreads that happening again, so he tends to move very tentatively when he can. 

On the brighter side, his sons are healing phenomenally well!

Papyrus is beginning to move around more—he spends less and less time beneath the armchair and more time running around the house with Sans. He always moves stiffly, however. It took Gaster a long while of observation to figure out that he was favoring his spine. He never twists or turns sharply, and he has trouble getting up if he’s been laying for a while. Gaster fears it has something to do with the concentrator, but it’s nothing he can confirm without an x-ray’s assistance. 

In the meantime, all of the running around Papyrus does has filed his claws down. They’re duller, now, more akin to normal blaster claws than daggers that leave deep scratches in Toriel’s floorboards. His teeth have dulled some, too, though not as quickly. He even (according to Sans) tolerates having them brushed. His dorsal spines remain as sharp as ever, since he does nothing to actively dull them on his own, and Gaster is torn about that. Should he have them dulled, when they get back to Snowdin, or leave them as they are? They do pose a minor danger—they’re sharp enough that an accidental stumble could leave someone’s hand or leg impaled. On the other hand, he’d hate to put Papyrus through another surgery (and arguably a cosmetic one) if he doesn’t have to.

(But he suspects he’s going to have to, anyhow—that concentrator has to be removed.)

Papyrus tolerates more touch than he used to, as well—sometimes he even seeks it out. He pads up to Sans and leans against him, or sits in front of the armchair and waits to be picked up and settled on Toriel’s lap. He’s starting to engage more with Gaster, too. Gaster is absolutely chuffed about that, although Sans had to help teach Gaster himself to play like blasters are supposed to.

They’d been out in the yard, one day, and Gaster had been watching his sons play tug-of-war. When Sans collapsed in the leaves to rest, Papyrus had trotted around the yard, swinging the rope in his jaws. He clearly had energy left—and then he turned to Gaster and dropped the rope in front of him. Gaster had stared.

“Awwww, he wants you to play,” Sans had said, his eyes widening. “Quick, play with him before he changes his mind.”

“Uuuh—”

“Come _on.”_ Sans sat up, making _hurry up_ motions with his hands. “Be friendly.”

“I don’t know—”

“Butt up.”

“What?”

“Butt _up._ Put your butt up in the air!”

Gaster had put his butt up in the air.

“Okay, now shoulders and head down. Open your mouth, doggy-smile, that’s it. Wag the tail. That’s not a wag, that’s a twitch, _wag.”_

So Gaster had playbowed to Papyrus, and Papyrus had looked genuinely _happy._ He playbowed back, and the two of them took off, bounding across the yard. Gaster tried his best to be gentle when it came to the tug-rope and let Papyrus win more often than not. They’d spent the whole afternoon playing, and by the end of it, Gaster was exhausted but absolutely thrilled. His son liked him. His son wanted to _play_ with him.

Even a few weeks ago, that would have seemed impossible.

Sans, too, is doing well—suspiciously so. He has nightmares, as they all do, but other than that, he seems to be taking things in stride. (Aside, of course, from his newfound overprotectiveness.) He eats and sleeps, he runs and plays and explores—as long as he has Papyrus and Gaster near him, anyhow—and he tells jokes and naps and overall seems completely, entirely _normal._ In fact, he’s so normal that Gaster thinks it _has_ to take an effort. It concerns him. 

Of course, he doesn’t _want_ Sans to be distressed by what happened to him, but the fact that he’s so obviously _not_ is strange. He’s definitely going to a therapist as soon as they get back to Snowdin. A child can’t endure what Sans has endured without being traumatized, resilient or not. Whatever he’s suppressing, it’s going to come out sooner or later, and Gaster wants to be ready for it—but he won’t push, right now. Sans needs to address things on his own time. It won’t do any good to force him into it. If anything, it would make him feel worse.

...right?

Gaster itches to get his hands—er, paws—on a psychology book or twelve.

Physically, Sans is fine. The eyesight in his right socket never returns, but he’s adapted to functioning without it, although his depth perception still gives him trouble. The wound on his tail is barely a scrape in his hominid form, and he’s only shifted once since then so Gaster could check how well it was healing in his blaster form. He made it a point to shift while Papyrus was sleeping; neither of them wanted him to get reattached to Sans’ blaster form and become distressed when it inevitably vanished again. The stump of Sans’ tail is healing well; a week or two more and the bone will have resolidified, Gaster thinks. 

It still _pisses him off_ to think about that wound, though.

Sans’ fighting skills are improving, too, and Gaster hopes he’ll be able to defend himself if anyone _ever_ tries to hurt him again. He dodges well enough, although not perfectly, not yet. Even so, Gaster begins teaching him to form his attacks.

“It’s not about brute force,” he repeats. “Tactic, Sans. Always tactic. You don’t need to be strong if you can be abundant.”

He teaches Sans to summon armies of bones, to turn them blue, to manipulate the gravity around him. He’s an adept student and a remarkable fighter, even with limited magic; Gaster is immensely pleased with his progress, although he knows they’ve still got a long ways to go. They train for at least an hour each day, and Sans improves in leaps and bounds. If anyone ever tries to take him again, they’ll find themselves hard-pressed to succeed.

This, at least, soothes Gaster’s constant anxiety some.

Toriel is an angel throughout the entire process. She nurtures the boys as though they were her own, and Gaster is unbelievably grateful for it—for her. He does what he can to make it up to her, but he doubts it will ever be enough. Most of the time, he scavenges up groceries for their meals. He takes the boys with him to the overgrown crop fields beyond the city, and they pick wild blackberries and raspberries, overgrown sweet corn and sorghum grain, lettuce and apples. Some things (like butterscotch and cinnamon) have to come from the scanty store within the Ruins; it’s run by a single froggit who’s more than willing to sell them everything they need, provided Gaster doesn’t eat him. The snails are abundant, near the river, and Gaster gathers baskets and baskets of them. Toriel teaches them how to suck the flesh out of the shell, although Gaster finds it much easier to simply crush the shell between his massive teeth.

Other times, Gaster will do what he can to make Toriel’s house a little easier to live in. He uses his basic mechanical knowledge to fix her sink (which had been leaking for some time) and, with the help of Sans’ opposable thumbs, rewires her stove to make it more energy-efficient. He puts new shingles on her house, piles up her firewood until she needn’t go searching for months more, lays down a fresh coat of paint in the living room and kitchen. (How strange it had been, learning to use a paintbrush with his teeth. His skull had been a veritable rainbow after he’d finished.) He practically begs her to let him replace the flooring their claws have ruined, but she refuses.

“This floor is almost as old as you are, scamp,” she says, tapping his nose. “It stays right where it is, but thank you for the offer.”

He sands it down, instead, until it’s almost even again. He takes her rugs out, pretends they’re Jackson, and beats the living shit out of them until they’re fresh and dust-free. He oils the hinges on all her doors until they’re quiet as mice, and he replaces one particularly filthy window with a crisp, clean pane of glass. 

Papyrus and Sans both grow to adore her—and why wouldn’t they? They like to sit on her lap and listen to her read, and they’ll usually fall asleep as she rocks them. Sans colors her pictures to hang on her fridge and walls, and she gushes over them each time, until his cheeks are blue and he’s beaming. He also likes to help her cook, and she teaches him all kinds of recipes. (He’s mostly interested in the sweets.) Most of the time, Papyrus will join them in the kitchen, weaving around their feet and snapping up the ingredients they not-so-accidentally drop. 

Gaster wishes, more than anything, that he could simply _talk_ to Toriel. She, of all people, would know how to help him deal with his grief. Unfortunately, she doesn’t speak his language, and he can’t sign (at least not _well,_ not yet) or write, so the only way for them to communicate is through Sans—and Gaster isn’t comfortable getting into an emotional conversation about slaughtered children with his son as the go-between, so he resigns himself to nothing but charades with Toriel. Fortunately, she’s very good at charades, and he’s getting better at them too, the longer he stays in this _stupid form._

Oh, how he misses having hands. He misses being small and convenient and unnoticeable. He misses walking on two legs. He misses being _him—_ but there’s no point missing those things. This is who he is now, whether he likes it or not, so he’d better get used to it and stop bitching. 

He thinks, perhaps, he would have been content to stay there with Toriel as long as she’d let them. He would have gone to visit his friends eventually, but if he had been allowed to return, or perhaps to bring them back with him, to the Ruins, where things are quiet and distant and his coward’s heart feels safe...

That isn’t the way it happens, though. Their leaving is less than ideal.

It happens in the afternoon. They’re all lazing around after lunch, warm and full and sleepy. The children nap, and Toriel sits in her armchair and reads a book about history. Gaster himself stares at the fire, his eyes half-lidded and content. He’s grown remarkably fond of the fireplace, these past few weeks. (If he closes his eyes, he can almost pretend it’s Grillby and he’s back in the bar, safe and sound and warm.)

When Sans wakes up, he wants to play hide and seek. It’s a difficult game for Papyrus to grasp, but Sans manages to coax him into it with a bag of chocolate chips as treats. The problem comes when Sans wants to try a new hiding spot.

“Hey, Tori,” he asks, sidling up to her. “What’s in that room down the hall? Next to your bedroom?”

“Oh, that?” Toriel smiles gently at him. “It’s just another bedroom, little one. Nothing too special.”

“Can me and Papyrus play in there?”

“You certainly can. Just try not to leave a mess, alright?”

Sans cheers and sets Papyrus next to Gaster. “Alright! Paps, you stay there. Dad, count to ten for him.”

Papyrus sits with rapt focus as Sans darts off and Gaster begins to count—he’s already learned that the countdown means he’ll get a chocolate chip _and_ pets from Sans soon. “...nine, ten,” Gaster finishes. “Ready or not, here he comes! Go get him, little one. Go find your silly big brother.”

Papyrus sets his nose to the ground, instantly alert; no doubt, tracking is another thing he’s been trained to do. Gaster’s uncomfortable letting him do it anymore, but if it’s treated like a game—well, if it’s treated like a game, perhaps Papyrus will learn to take it less seriously. 

Leastways, that’s what Gaster had hoped.

* * *

Papyrus sets his nose close to the ground, sucking air in through his nasals. He smells dust, and shoes, and crust crumbs; he also smells Little Master. He follows that scent easily. It’s fresh and clear, and it takes him right to the room in the middle of the hallway. Huh. He’s never been in here before—he inches forward cautiously, sniffing the air. It smells dry and unused and musty. Little Master’s scent is the strongest here, and he follows it towards the bed and shimmies underneath it, yapping victoriously. Found him, found him!

“Heh, good job, buddy,” Little Master says, scratching beneath his chin. Papyrus squirms happily, looking eagerly for his treat. Little Master offers a chocolate chip, and he eagerly snaps it up. Mmmm. “You’re so great at this game. Papyrus, world-class Hide and Seeker, that’s you. Wanna play again?”

Papyrus wags his tail in agreement and backs up to let Little Master out from under the bed. The two of them head for the door, but Papyrus pauses—near the toybox at the end of the bed, he catches an eerily familiar scent. His spines begin to bristle, and he prowls closer. 

“Oh, hey—more toys. Cool.” Little Master drops to his knees next to the box. “I didn’t know these were here. You want one, Paps?”

Papyrus hooks his paws over the side of the toybox, plunging his nose inside. It’s faint, but it’s here. He knows it’s here. Rage begins to curdle in his chest. His bones rattle. Where is it? _Where is it?_ He has to find it, he has to find it, _he has to find it—_

He finds it. 

It’s an innocent-looking thing; a stuffed bear with black button eyes and a purple ribbon around its neck. He pulls it out of the box and sets it on the ground, staring at it. The scent is faded, barely there, but he recognizes it. It’s ingrained into his mind just as much as any Command ever was: human. To smell it now fills him with an awful sense of rage and loathing—and, what’s worse, with fear. He hasn’t smelled a human since he left Master. He thought, maybe, that he was done hunting them. To have this scent placed in front of him now shatters that idea entirely; he has to work. He has to be good. He has to impress his new masters. It’s only what’s expected of him.

Who knows what will happen if he doesn’t?

“Aw, that’s pretty cute, huh?” Little Master says, peering down at the bear. “Do you like it?”

Papyrus opens his mouth, fits his jaws around the bear’s head, and rips it off. He tugs stuffing out of its body in mounds, snarling viciously, tearing his claws down its belly and legs. Little Master gapes.

“Wow, okay, gonna take that as a no. Here, buddy, here, stop, let me have it—”

But Little Master doesn’t offer him the right Command, so this talking must be a distraction to test his concentration. His first Master taught him well how to ignore distractions.

* * *

“Off,” Master commands, and 134 tightens his jaws around the human-scented stick, snarling. Ordinary Commands are not to be obeyed, in this situation—it’s something he’s been taught over long hours and vicious beatings. A human could command him, if they wanted to; that’s why there’s a Command that no one but his Master knows. 

_Click._ A happy thrill courses down 134’s spine at the sound. He’s doing well. 

“Leave it.” Ignore. “Down.” Ignore, ignore, ignore. And then, a Command that none but his Master would say, in the midst of a fight: “Good job.”

134 releases the stick, panting eagerly. Master clicks and tosses him a piece of fresh meat, and 134 falls upon it, chewing vigorously. He is content.

* * *

Papyrus gets the bear between his jaws and shakes his head furiously, scattering stuffing across the room. Little Master’s hand seizes the bear’s leg and tugs it, and a flare of aggression rattles Papyrus’ bones. He wants to bite that hand. He wants to take it between his teeth and bear down until all of those little bones _crunch._

He’s been beaten within an inch of his life for biting a master, though. It was a lesson well-learned. 

* * *

“And if you ever, _ever_ think about hurting me again—” Master snarls, slamming the Staff into 134’s skull. A sickening crack rings through his head, and he cries out in pain. The hearing on his right side cuts out in a sudden, deafening whine. He tries desperately to roll onto his back, to tuck his tail, but to no avail—Master will not accept his submission as apology, not this time. “—I’ll fucking _kill_ you, do you understand me? I’ll cut your goddamn head off, you sick little bastard. I taught you better than that.”

The Staff crashes into 134’s spine, and he shrieks in agony. The wires that run through his back weren’t meant to bend so far; he spasms, and his hind legs suddenly lock up. He can’t move them. Terror is a black, rotting thing in his chest. Master stands over him, panting. “Fuck,” he says, ruffling his feathers. One drops towards the floor, swaying gently in the air. “You can just stay like that for a while. Learn your lesson.”

Master leaves him broken and unhealed, and 134 drags himself to the corner of his cage with his front paws. Once there, he collapses, panting in pain. His bones shake. He was bad. He was very, very bad. He will never, ever, _ever_ be that bad again.

* * *

The memory of that particular occurrence grates against him, and he tugs harder at the bear. The seams rip—Little Master gets one half, and Papyrus gets the other. He topples backwards, then scrambles to his feet again, determined to hurt the tattered bear until he’s given the correct Command. Little Master stares at him, horrified. 

“Papyrus? Papyrus, stop. You don’t have to do that,” he says. “It’s okay.”

Now that he’s found the scent, it’s impossible to ignore. It isn’t only on the bear—as he staggers towards the back of the room, he smells the shoes. They reek of humans; some more than others. He lunges at the strongest-smelling one and pins it to the ground, shredding it with his teeth. 

“Sans?” Dad crouches in the hallway, snakes his head into the room. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know.” Little Master stumbles towards Papyrus, then hesitates. “He’s—he found one of the toys and he just—now he won’t listen to me, and—”

“Give him a Command.”

_“What?”_

“Tell him to leave it. We can’t just let him destroy things like this, and I don’t want you trying to take anything from him. You might be bitten.”

“But I don’t want to—”

“I know,” Dad says. His voice sounds pained. Papyrus shakes his head and flings one of the shoes angrily against the wall before diving at the next one. “I know you don’t. I don’t want you to, either, but we don’t have a choice if he won’t listen to you.”

Little Master looks utterly miserable, but he looks at Papyrus, and in the Command Language, he says, “Paps, leave it. Please?”

There’s no authority in his voice—not that it matters. It isn’t the right Command. Little Master tries a host of others, but none of them are correct. Papyrus is...tired. How long are they going to keep doing this? How long until he’s proven himself good enough? But he won’t stop! He won’t! Not until his master tells him to; he’s good, he can be good.

“He’s not listening,” Little Master says, looking desperately at Dad.

“Go into the living room.”

“But—”

“Go on, Sans. I don’t want him attacking you.”

“He won’t attack me.” Little Master’s voice becomes bitter. “He’s afraid of me.”

Dad presses his muzzle to Little Master’s skull, then pushes him out into the hallway. After that, he snakes a paw forward and cups it around Papyrus. Papyrus has in no way been trained not to attack another beast—he opens mouth and snaps viciously at Dad’s paw, clawing his wrist. 

(Somewhere, in this shitty soul they’ve given him, guilt rears its ugly head. Why are they making him do this? Why do they have to use _Dad_ as a distraction? It’s not fair.)

* * *

“134, attention.”

134 comes to attention, laying neatly beside his master, his head up and his bones tensed to move. In front of him, a stuffed dummy wrapped in human-scented cloth. Between him and the dummy, a small beast—smaller, even, than 134. It can’t be more than a few months out of the solution. It crouches low to the ground, trembling. Its eyes, too, are locked on their master, earnestly awaiting his Command.

What 134 doesn’t know is that it has been trained to attack something quite inhuman.

“135, attention.”

The small beast comes to attention, standing straight and tall. It regards 134 quietly—they are, although they don’t know it, the closest thing their master has to twins. 

“135, defend.”

135 lowers its head, bristles its spines, and clicks its lower jaw in warning. 134 returns its posturing, a growl rumbling in his chest.

“134, attack.”

134 has been trained to attack one thing and one thing only—anything that gets in his way is merely an inconvenience. He lunges forward, skirting around 135 and heading straight for the human scent. He springs up, and 135 slams into his side. They roll across the ground, snarling and snapping. 135 hooks its claws into 134’s eyes and he howls, gouging his hind claws furiously across the underside of 135’s spine. He kicks 135 off of him, then scrambles to his feet and races for the dummy again—and again, 135 stops him.

134 growls in irritation, whipping around and hooking his fangs into the vertebrae just behind the back of 135’s skull. He shakes his head, giving 135 a good firm rattle, and then flings it away and turns back to the dummy. 135 scrambles up and jumps in front of him, bristling and lashing its tail. There’s fear in its eyes—not fear of him, not really. Fear of Master. Fear of what will happen if it doesn’t succeed.

134 knows that fear well.

That’s precisely why he’s determined to get to the dummy, no matter what distractions Master puts in his way. He takes a deep breath and springs back into the fray. This time, when he hooks his teeth around 135’s vertebrae, he doesn’t let go. He bears down until 135 screams in agony, its claws skittering across the floor. 

It goes limp, finally, and he drops it. Its chest heaves, but it doesn’t rise to stop him again. He bolts for the dummy the second he can—he’s tarried too long already. He wraps his jaws around the dummy and tears it to pieces, growling savagely. He only stops when Master comes to stand beside him.

“Good job, 134,” he says, and 134 releases the dummy, panting.

Then Master turns to 135, who has already rolled onto their back, submitting desperately to him. He lifts the Staff and brings it down against 135—again, again, again. 134 watches, numb. He’s glad it wasn’t him. 

He’s just...glad it wasn’t him.

* * *

“That’s enough, little one,” Dad murmurs, drawing Papyrus out of the room and shutting the door. Only then does he release Papyrus, who flings himself against the door, panting. Another obstacle? Are they _kidding?_ This is hard. When he proves unable to slam the door down, he takes to digging frantically at the base of it, his claws gouging the wood. 

“Oh, dear—what’s the matter?” Soft Master asks, kneeling next to Dad. 

“I don’t know,” Dad admits. “It must be something in the room. He’s—”

Dad pauses, then, an odd look flickering across his face.

“What?” Soft Master asks. “What is it, Wingdings?”

“Humans,” Dad says. “Humans stay there, don’t they?”

“Yes. What of it?” Soft Master frowns, folding her arms across her chest. “If you’re going to tell me off for taking care of them, then you can just—”

“No, no, nothing like that. It’s just—he was created to hunt humans. It would make sense for Jackson to have trained him for that.” Dad clicks his teeth. Papyrus brightens some, reinvigorated—he must be doing the right thing. He claws harder at the door, the wood splintering beneath his claws. “It must smell like them, inside.”

Soft Master makes a small, pained sound. “Of course—of course you monsters would design something to hunt humans.” Her voice is, for the very first time, bitter. “Human children! What have you all become, out there? You’re no better than our enemies. This is exactly why I left. If I don’t defend them from you, who will?”

“I didn’t want this,” Dad snaps. “I _never_ wanted this.”

“Oh, didn’t you?” Soft Master demands. “You told me that was _exactly_ what you created Sans to do; the only thing you regret is that you _failed.”_

Papyrus smells Dad’s shame, dark and bitter. “I didn’t—”

“You wanted to kill humans,” Soft Master says sharply. “You’re just like the rest of them. Can you tell me that if a human fell down right now you’d let them live?”

“I’d—if they didn’t hurt anyone, I wouldn’t hurt them!”

Soft Master studies him, a deep frown on her face. “Perhaps you wouldn’t,” she finally concedes. “You’re better than most, in that respect. But Papyrus—”

“But Papyrus,” Dad agrees quietly. 

They’re silent for a long moment. “I think,” Soft Master says, “that maybe it’s time for you to go.”

“Yes,” Dad says. “I think so.”

“What?” Little Master demands, pushing his way back into the hall. “Why? Just because Papyrus messed up? You’re going to kick us out for _that?”_

“Sans—”

“Dear one.” Soft Master kneels in front of him, and he frowns severely at her. “I love you all. You’re more than welcome to visit whenever you want to, but your little brother has been trained to hunt children. Humans fall into my home, from time to time, and I take care of them.”

“But humans are bad,” Sans argues. “They hurt people. How come you help them?”

Soft Master shakes her head. “Saying all humans are bad is like saying all monsters are bad. Some of them are, I’ll grant you that—but some of them aren’t. I want to give all humans a fair chance to live here.”

“But without their souls, we’re never gonna get out of the Underground.”

“That is because your king is a coward,” Soft Master says, her eyes narrowing. “To take an innocent life simply to escape this place—is that not terribly selfish?”

Little Master glances at his feet, hunching his shoulders.

Soft Master continues,“I would be content to live out the rest of my years here, if it meant I could spare one innocent life. Besides, you have people in the Underground who love you and miss you very much. The humans who fall down here? They only have me. I can’t compromise their safety by keeping Papyrus here, no matter how much I love him. You understand, don’t you?”

“I guess,” Little Master says, hugging himself. “I just—he doesn’t mean to be this way. He’s not a bad person.”

“Dear, I know that. Papyrus is a remarkable little boy, and he’s going to grow into a remarkable monster, one day. With so many people to love and support him, I’m sure he’s going to recover in no time at all—but he can’t stay here for the rest of his life. Don’t you all want to go home?”

“I guess,” Little Master murmurs. 

Jaws close around Papyrus’ shoulders, and he shrieks and struggles against them. He’s not supposed to let anything distract him from his target, not _anything._ He _needs_ to get into that room or they’ll hurt him, they’ll beat him, they’ll go and get the Staff. It would be worse, if Little Master beat him. It would be so much worse. Little Master has been so kind to him, so good, and now Papyrus is going to disappoint him—

He wails, clawing the air as he’s carried into the front of the house. They talk over his head for a time, and Soft Master hugs Little Master, and says something he can’t hear through the ringing in his head. Then Dad carries him down the stairs, through an enormous purple door, and away from the home Papyrus has come to know and love. He screams and snarls and then, at last, he bursts into sobs. He’s failed. Dad has won—again, _again!_ —and Little Master is going to beat Papyrus for it.

He is sick with fear.

But the Staff doesn’t come. Cruel words and hard hands don’t come. Perhaps they’re waiting until they’ve taken him far from the house; perhaps they’re waiting until they’ve returned him to Master. Perhaps they won’t bother punishing him themselves. Of course. Such work is surely beneath Little Master. He’ll let Master do it, instead. Papyrus goes limp in Dad’s grip, shuddering and curling his tail between his legs.

He doesn’t want to be hurt. He really tried. He really, really did. 

Tears roll down his face, and the cold freezes them. Dad pauses in the middle of the pathway and sets him down. Papyrus stumbles, his bones shaking violently. Snow crunches beneath his claws, and he loathes it. He wants to go back through the door, back to the small purple house. He wants to curl up beneath the armchair and never, ever come out again.

“Papyrus.” Little Master kneels in front of him. “Hey, it’s okay. Why are you so upset, huh? There aren’t any humans here. You can relax.”

Papyrus does what makes sense. He lowers himself to the ground and rolls onto his back, for whatever good it does.

When Little Master speaks again, his voice cracks. “Stop it. Stop doing that. Get up.”

Papyrus shakes and shakes and doesn’t get up. He can’t. He can’t possibly.

_“Dammit!”_ Little Master shouts to the snow, the trees, the endless fog above them. Papyrus flinches. “I’m not going to hurt you, I’m not _ever_ going to hurt you. Why can’t you understand that? I’m not like Jackson. I’m not ever gonna be like him!”

Dad croons softly, curling up around the two of them. “Little one—”

“Why is he scared of me?” Little Master asks. Tears roll down his face, and his breath shudders. That’s—that’s not right. Masters don’t cry. For some reason, the sight of Little Master’s tears hurts worse than any beating ever could. Papyrus whimpers softly. His own eyes sting. “I’ve never hurt him and I’m never going to.”

“It’s not because of you,” Dad murmurs. “You know it’s not because of you, Sans. It’s because of what Jackson did to him.”

“But I’m not Jackson!” Little Master scrubs an arm across his eyes and sits in the snow, hugging his knees to his chest. Papyrus _hurts_ for him. He rolls onto his stomach, panting anxiously, waiting for the Staff; when it doesn’t come, he drags himself forward on his belly. Sans glares at him for a moment—but a moment only. Then his face softens, and more tears roll over his sockets and down his face. “I don’t want you to be scared of me. I’m not him. I’m not your master, I’m your _brother._ That’s all I want to be, Papyrus.”

Brother. Papyrus doesn’t know what that means, but if that’s what his master—if that’s what _Sans_ wants to be, then who is he to complain? Papyrus gingerly gets his feet beneath him, moving slowly, wincing each time Sans shifts. When no blow comes, he leans forward, his fear coursing through him. He touches his muzzle to Sans’ cheek. His tears taste like Papyrus’ do, salt and magic.

He waits to be pushed away.

Instead, Sans wraps his arms around Papyrus’ neck and pulls him closer.

Papyrus shudders and folds against Sans’ chest, his own breath hitching. Sans pets his back, and there is no pain. There is no pain. There is no Staff. There are no masters here.

For the first time, Papyrus dares to hope that there never will be again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: 135 was created using papyrus’ genome, so they’re identical twins (along with about twelve other blasters created with the same genome). even their fonts are the same, although their personalities varied wildly. 135 was much more timid than paps, and he was put down bc of that shortly after this flashback scene.


	22. you don't need tibia worried

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: discussions of child abuse/neglect, symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder, discussions of war/violence/death
> 
> we have a bunch!!!! of incredible art this chapter!!!!!! im still floored people want to make things for this fic aaaa;lkdgj;
> 
> [here](https://mirkrali.tumblr.com/post/190664721169/apologies-for-the-shoddy-quality-i-was-inspired) is some lovely art of the three blaster boys by @mirkrali on tumblr!!
> 
> [here](https://a-big-chicken-nerd.tumblr.com/post/190657685317/parsnipit-be-careful-yall-this-got-a-lot-of) and [here](https://a-big-chicken-nerd.tumblr.com/post/190710522616/parsnipit) are some phenomenal animations of jackson and the baby blasters by @a-big-chicken-nerd!! beware flashing and all the icky abuse stuff in the fic, though!!!
> 
> and last but certainly not least, we have [this](https://aeris-blue.tumblr.com/post/190709963775/parsnipit-you-clever-little-sneak) adorable piece by @aeris-blue from that one chapter wherein grillby discusses dragons!!! that might be kinda relevant pretty soon ;)
> 
> thank you all so much again for the time and effort you put into making those!!!! youre incredible a;lgkjd

Sans carries Papyrus the whole way home. His brother trembles in his arms, but he isn’t sobbing or fighting any longer. He continues to gaze over Sans’ shoulder, back at the Ruins—back at the first safe place he’s ever known. Sans feels like a piece of shit, taking him away from it, but Dad is right. That isn’t their home, and they can’t stay there forever; the human scent alone would distress Papyrus too much, now that he’s aware of it. 

“Come here,” Dad murmurs as they near the town, crouching next to him. “Climb on. We’re taking a shortcut.”

“Not like last time, right?”

“Last time?”

“Yeah, when you jumped through a  _ wall— _ without warning me, by the way.”

“Ah.” Dad chuckles wearily. “No, not like last time.”

Sans clambers onto Dad’s back, keeping Papyrus carefully in his arms, and they take the back route to their house. Dad keeps himself low and quiet, his head down and spines flat—clearly, he isn’t in the mood for company tonight. Despite his size, he moves quietly. The only hint of their passing is an ominous shadow, the glint of dim eyelights, and the subtle click of bone and crunch of snow.

As soon as they reach the house, Dad squeezes himself through the doorway and kicks the door shut behind them. Then he flops to the floor with a deep, exhausted sigh. “Home sweet home,” he murmurs.

Sans cradles Papyrus to his chest and looks around their living room. It feels so...empty, so unfamiliar and bleak. A fine layer of dust covers everything. “What happened to Remy?”

“Asgore is taking care of him.”

“Oh. Cool.” He wanders through the living room, the kitchen. It smells like must. Their fridge is empty. So is their freezer. He wonders, briefly, if their water and electricity are still on. He twists the sink handle, and water gushes from the tap. He flicks the lights, and they gleam brightly. Asgore must have paid the bills. 

He walks upstairs, and he finds their rooms in equal states of dustiness and disuse. The window screen in his room has been repaired, the window shut (and fastened with a new child lock), but other than that, it’s exactly how he left it. His bed is still unmade. Toys scatter across his floor. He treks back down the hall and ducks into Dad’s room, flopping into his bed. It smells like him—like safety, like security, like familiar things. He sighs softly. 

“Welcome home, Pap,” he murmurs.

Papyrus still hasn’t stopped trembling. Sans just holds him, smoothing a hand carefully down his spine. He burrows underneath the blankets, and he remembers being small, curled up in this very bed, his father at his side and a bright future ahead of him. He hopes he can give Papyrus that feeling, one day. 

God, he misses Toriel already. This change in routine is really going to make things worse.

Dad’s claws click on the stairs, and then he snakes his head and shoulders into the room. His haunches lay abandoned in the hallway, his tail undoubtedly draping down the stairs. This home is too small. (Any house, Sans thinks, is too small for a blaster his father’s size.) “How is he?” Dad asks.

“He’s okay. Still scared.”

“Poor thing.” Dad sighs quietly, squirming forward and setting his head on the end of the bed. Sans sits up and pets his nose. “How are you?”

“I’m okay. It feels different here.”

“Yes. I thought the same thing.”

For a time, the three of them simply lay in silence. Papyrus’ trembling eventually eases, although he doesn’t look happy by any means. He continues to gaze around himself, tense and wary, and winces whenever either of them moves too quickly. Eventually, Dad heaves himself to his feet. He has to flatten his spines completely to keep from scraping the doorway. 

“Would you like to help me make dinner?” he asks. “I don’t think these paws are quite capable of it.”

“Sure.” Sans stands, keeping Papyrus in his arms, and follows his dad downstairs. He sets Papyrus down once they reach the living room, although the pup sticks close to his heels. They make a simple dinner of macaroni and cheese, and Sans pours a glass of milk for himself and a bowl of the same for Dad. He warms yet more milk over the stove under Dad’s watchful eye, stirring in honey and cinnamon the way Toriel had taught him, and then pours it into a bottle. 

“Glad I kept all this baby stuff now,” Dad murmurs, curling up in the living room. He doesn’t fit well in the kitchen. Sans takes a seat on the couch, and Papyrus hops up next to him and sets his head in his lap. Sans tries to coax him into eating, but he turns his head away, burying it into Sans’ stomach. Sans sighs softly and turns his attention to his own food. “I guess we should tell everyone we’re back, huh?”

“Probably,” Sans says through a mouthful of mac ‘n cheese. Food makes everything better, seriously. “Maybe tomorrow? Pap’s not going to like all those strangers.”

“No. Perhaps I can convince them to come over one at a time. We’ll need to get another bed, and more clothes, and I need to have a doctor come and check you both out again, and—” He rubs his skull with his paws, groaning. “Oh, stars. Back to the grind.”

“Am I going back to school?”

“Do you want to?”

Sans swings his legs over the side of the couch. He thinks about what it would be like to leave his dad, his baby brother, to be apart and alone for some many hours. “...not yet. Maybe I can try again next year?”

“Certainly, little one. I’m sure you’ll catch up in no time.” Dad sounds relieved. He brings his hind paw up and scratches lazily at his collar. The sound of bone scraping on bone pricks at Sans’ nerves, and he sinks his fingers into the couch cushions.

“Are you going back to work?”

“I—” Dad opens his mouth, then shuts it. He rests his hind leg back on the floor, shaking his head. “Not yet.”

“Okay.” Sans is selfishly glad—he doesn’t want to be away from his father again, not so soon. “I don’t really—”

He freezes as he hears the jiggle of the front doorknob. Dad’s head jerks up, his spines bristling, and he moves to stand protectively in front of the couch. Papyrus tenses in his arms, his breaths coming more quickly.

“Who’s there?” Dad demands, his voice a low rumble. Silence greets him. The tumblers in the lock click, and the door begins to swing open. Dim magic whines to life in Dad’s chest, flickers white against his ribs, throws shadows against the floor. “Don’t come any—”

Firelight spills onto the welcome rug. Grillby stands in their doorway, his flames flickering angry red at the edges, his sword strapped to his hip. 

Dad wheezes and lays back down. 

“Grillby!” Sans scrambles off of the couch. The red in Grillby’s flames quickly shades to yellow, his eyes widening behind his glasses. Sans surges forward, throwing himself into the elemental’s arms. He smells like campfires, like warm smoke and autumn and growing up. Sans’ eyes sting. “Grillby, hey, hi—what are you doing here?”

Grillby drops to his knees, hugging Sans tightly. He buries his face against Sans’ shoulder, cupping the back of Sans’ head with one warm hand. Sans doesn’t complain—far from it. He leans into the hug, squeezing Grillby. God, he’d missed this. He’d missed his friends so  _ much.  _ He lets Grillby hang on as long as he wants to, studying the colors of his flames carefully—red and yellow and blue and there, deep and dull but  _ there,  _ green. 

When Grillby finally pulls back, he lifts one hand to shakily sign.  _ Sans, oh, thank the stars, you’re okay. I was so worried about you! _

_ It’s okay,  _ Sans signs back, patting Grillby’s shoulder.  _ We’re all okay. We’ve just been in the Ruins for a while. _

_ So I heard. I’m glad you’re all back, safe and sound.  _

_ Why do you have a key?  _ Sans asks, pointing to the key in Grillby’s hand.

_ Oh, this—Asgore gave it to me. I was watching your house while you were gone. I became concerned when I noticed that the lights were on. _

_ Dad shouted at you. _

_ Did he? I’m quite sorry. I couldn’t hear him. _

_ I know. It’s okay.  _ He glances back at Dad, who has his face covered by his paws.  _ He’s...recovering from the scare. _

_ Is he, now?  _ Grillby straightens up. His flames crackle red, and he stomps a foot against the floor. The vibrations bring Dad’s head up, his eyes seeking Grillby’s hands on instinct.  _ You. I’ve got a lot to say to you, Wingdings Gaster, and most of it isn’t appropriate for children.  _

Dad cringes, scraping his paws over his muzzle.

_ But all of that can wait.  _ Grillby kneels in front of him, flames fading to orange again. He reaches out, setting one palm gently against Dad’s cheek. Dad leans into the touch, his eyes closing briefly.  _ I’m just glad you’re home safe. I thought I’d lost you, old friend. I was so frightened, I was so—so— _

Dad warbles quietly, leaning his forehead against Grillby’s chest. “I’m here now,” he says, although he cannot sign and Grillby cannot hear—Sans takes it upon himself to translate, as best he can, although Grillby’s eyes are all for Dad at the moment. “I’m sorry I scared you. I won’t be going away anytime soon.”

_ You’re staying here, aren’t you?  _ Grillby asks, faltering. He touches the side of Dad’s jaw, and Dad nods earnestly.  _ Good. _

“Yes, I’m staying. I won’t be leaving anyone again—not Sans, not Papyrus, not you, Grillby,” Dad says, his voice unbearably fond. He moves to cradle his paws around Grillby, rubbing his face affectionately against Grillby’s chest. Sans is reminded quite sharply of a cat greeting its owner after days away. “Grillby, Grillby, silly Grillby, I missed you very much.”

_ Yes, yes,  _ Grillby laughs, sputtering yellow and pink at the edges. Dad’s sentiment must be clear, despite the fact Grillby can’t understand his words, because the next thing Grillby says is,  _ I missed you too. Hey—hey, that tickles—! _

Dad chuffs in amusement, nibbling against the side of Grillby’s face in the same grooming gesture he uses to clean dirt from Sans or Papyrus’ bones. Grillby pushes playfully against him for a moment, then resigns himself with a flickering, amused sigh. Dad tucks the elemental quite contently against his chest, lidding his eyes and kneading the carpet with his claws. 

_ I suppose you can’t sign in this form?  _ Grillby asks, peeking up at him.

Dad shakes his head.

_ Very well. We’ll figure something out. In the meantime, you’re missing someone. Where’s Papyrus? _

Sans trots over to the couch. Papyrus has wedged himself tightly into a corner, his sides heaving with each stuttered breath, his eyes wide. Carefully, Sans scoops him up, and the pup looks on Grillby with absolute terror. He pushes his muzzle into Sans’ neck, his bones rattling.  _ Here he is,  _ Sans says.  _ He’s...scared of strangers. I mean, I know you met before, but— _

_ It was a very brief meeting,  _ Grillby says, inclining his head.  _ I understand. Is he well? _

_ He’s...okay. _

_ As much as one can expect, I suppose. Well—while I’m here, is there anything I can do for the three of you? _

Dad shakes his head. Sans rocks on his heels, frowning.  _ Can you stay the night?  _ he asks.

“Can he  _ what?”  _ Dad demands.

_ Stay the night.  _ Sans points at Grillby’s sword.  _ He can make sure nobody else comes in. _

“So can I,” Dad grumbles. 

_ You need to  _ sleep,  _ not stay up all night worrying,  _ Sans scolds.

_ I’ll stay,  _ Grillby says.  _ The three of you can rest easy.  _

Sans cheers, heading for the stairs.  _ Awesome. I’m gonna give Paps a bath before bedtime—you two have fun catching up. _

As he steps into the bathroom, he hears the TV flick on, and he grimaces. Dad and Grillby definitely going to watch shitty soap operas and bask in silence—not that they have a choice, Sans supposes. Their communication  _ is  _ rather limited, at the moment. Sans sets Papyrus down on the bathroom floor, and Papyrus hunkers down on himself, his tail between his legs.

“Hey,” Sans says, scratching beneath his chin. Papyrus looks miserably at him. “It’s okay, bro. Grillby’s our friend. He won’t let anybody hurt you. He’s a really cool guy. You know. Metaphorically.”

Sans fills the bathtub (Papyrus winces away from the noise, flattening out against the ground) and drizzles in bubbles. Once he’s done that, he taps the side of the tub. “Here, look,” he says. Papyrus scoots closer. “It’s just water. It’s kind of like the solution. You remember the solution, right? You were made in it. Er—probably.”

Papyrus peeks over the edge. Sans hoists him up, setting him down in the water. He splays his claws, holds himself low and uncertain, and looks up at Sans. Sans blinks at him. Papyrus blinks back. Stellar communication.

As Sans rubs a warm washcloth across Papyrus’ bones, his little brother finally,  _ finally _ begins to relax. He sits down in the water, studying the bubbles warily. “That’s because of amphipathic molecules,” Sans explains. “Dad taught me all about them. He likes teaching people things. I think he’d make a good teacher, you know? But he really loves being a scientist, so—”

Papyrus sighs softly, his head drooping. His nose touches the water.

“Tired, huh? Yeah. I feel that. It’s been a long day.” He scoops water over Papyrus’ back, rinsing the suds off. Papyrus trembles, then leans back into his hand. Sans scratches gently between his vertebrae, and Papyrus’ spines fan out. It’s different from bristling, he notices—bristling brings them straight up, wicked and dangerous. Fanning only lifts them a few inches, allowing Sans to scatch Papyrus’ back more easily. It’s a tiny show of trust, and Sans cherishes it. 

Once Papyrus is clean, Sans scoops him out of the tub and towels him dry. He quickly scrubs himself off in the shower (he doesn’t look at the gray smudges on his soul, he doesn’t,  _ he doesn’t) _ , then hops out and slings a towel around his waist. He heads to his room, Papyrus on his heels, and pulls on his pajamas. “I wonder where Dad put my baby clothes,” Sans says, humming thoughtfully. “I bet some of them would fit you.” 

He darts back out, leaning over the railing. “Hey, Dad?”

Dad stands and sets a paw on the second floor, raising himself to Sans’ level. “Yes?”

“Where’s my baby stuff? Papyrus needs pajamas.”

“It should be out in the shed. Just a moment.” He slips outside, his tail flicking, and Sans waves at Grillby. Grillby waves back. When Dad returns, he lifts a box to Sans’ level and drops it over the railing. “There you are.”

“Thanks.” Sans pats his nose, then runs back to his room. He pulls out a little blue t-shirt with red rockets on it. “Huh. This is cute, right? What do you think?”

He dresses Papyrus, who stands and tolerates it. Once they’re both dressed, Sans heads downstairs. He doesn’t notice that Papyrus isn’t following him until he hears an anxious whine. He turns around and finds Papyrus pacing anxiously at the top of the staircase. 

Below him, Dad laughs.

“Hey, don’t be mean,” Sans says, scowling at him. “He’s a baby. Did you know how to go down stairs at twelve months old? Nuh-uh, I didn’t  _ think so.” _

“No, no, it’s not that,” Dad says, wiping his eyes. “Ah, I don’t mean to make fun. He knows how to go  _ up  _ stairs, I’m sure. I’ve seen him do it. Perhaps it’s going down that frightens him, but oh, it’s just—Jackson wanted to create a living weapon, impeccably trained, ready for any eventualities, and then he—he—” Dad laughs again, a cracked noise. Sans shifts his weight nervously. “He didn’t teach it how to use  _ stairs!” _

The last word is practically a snarl. Papyrus shrinks back, and Sans gulps. He wants to go back to Toriel’s now, please and thank you. “Uh—”

“Ugh.” Dad rubs his face before climbing to his feet and heading for the door. “I’m sorry. I’ll be right back.”

He steps outside, and Sans and Grillby trade a look.

_ Has he...been like that?  _ Grillby asks.

_ Um. A few times? But not often. I think the change of scenery really...threw both of them.  _ He gestures to Papyrus, too.  _ Dad’s just upset. _

_ And he has every right to be. I expect you’ll all be in therapy soon?  _

Sans squirms.  _ Haven’t talked about it, really. _

_ No? I think it would be good for all of you. Your father, too. _

_ Yeah. He definitely needs something.  _ Sans moves down a few steps, then crouches, patting the step just beneath Papyrus. “Okay, bud. C’mon. You can do this.”

One climbing lesson later and Papyrus is back on the first floor. Sans flops onto the couch next to Grillby, and Papyrus hesitates before wedging himself underneath the couch. His tail-tip peeks out, flicking back and forth.

_ So what kind of things did you do in the Ruins?  _ Grillby asks. Sans spends the next half-hour regaling him with their adventures, until Dad finally slips back into the house. There’s frost on his bones. Grillby frowns and moves over, running his hands across Dad’s frame until the frost melts and drips onto the carpet. Dad shudders beneath his touch, but he doesn’t move away.  _ Really, Wings. It’s cold out there, especially at night. You need to be more careful. _

Dad sighs and slumps to the floor again. Papyrus’ tail-tip vanishes, to be replaced by the tip of his muzzle. Dad rumbles softly at him, edging forward until he can boop Papyrus’ snoot with his own. Papyrus paws Dad’s muzzle gently, then tucks himself further beneath the couch. Sans leans against Grillby, and he tries to keep his eyes open through one more garbage episode of  _ The Young and the Restless.  _

After that episode, Dad gently scoops Sans up in his mouth and carries him upstairs. Papyrus bounds after them. “Wait—” Sans squirms as Dad heads for the bedroom at the end of the hall. “Can I stay with you tonight?” Dad hesitates. “Just one night? Please? I’m—” He clicks his teeth. “I don’t want to be alone.”

Dad relents, as Sans knew he would. He sets Sans down on his own bed, and Papyrus hops up to join him. He curls into Sans’ lap, and Sans pets his skull gently. “I’m going to say goodnight to Grillby,” he says. “I’ll be right back.”

He slips back down the stairs. Sans snuggles underneath the covers, pulling them up over Papyrus. His brother relaxes once he’s shielded from the wide, bright space of the bedroom. “Night, Papyrus,” Sans murmurs, yawning. “See you in the morning.”

He stays awake just long enough to feel Dad’s head settle onto the mattress next to him, and then he sleeps.

* * *

He wakes up gasping, once or twice, and Dad nuzzles him patiently back to sleep each time. When he wakes up for  _ real,  _ he realizes he can smell something cooking. He also realizes that his brother and father are still with him, so it must be  _ Grillby  _ who’s cooking. Sans is ecstatic. It’s been so long since he’s had any Grillby-food,  _ so long.  _ He starts to inch his way out of the bed, moving slowly so he doesn’t wake his companions, when Papyrus’ head lifts. He watches Sans with troubled eyes. 

“Awake already?” Sans asks. “I guess it must be hard to sleep in a new place. You wanna come downstairs with me? See what Grillbz is makin’?”

He rolls out of bed and heads for stairs. Papyrus follows close on his heels, slinking down the hallway with his head and tail low. Sans hurts for him—he can’t wait until Papyrus has adjusted to their new living quarters. He felt like they were actually making  _ progress,  _ at Toriel’s, and now—

And now.

He enters the kitchen, making a point to stomp his feet so the vibrations travel through the floor. Grillby waves absently to him—he’s focused intently on a bowl full of batter. Sans moves forward and hugs his leg; he will not be so easily dismissed, not even for breakfast, thank  _ you. _

_ Good morning, Sans. _

_ Morning, Grillbz. Whatcha makin’?  _ Pancakes, Sans thinks. It’s definitely gotta be pancakes. That batter, those blueberries, the syrup—

_ Waffles. _

“Agh!” He rubs his face. “Foiled again by your dastardly cunning.”

Grillby chuckles.  _ What can I say? I’m a prodigy. How was your night? _

_ It was good. I dunno if Papyrus slept at all, but other than that.  _ He shrugs.

_ And how is Papyrus this morning? _

Sans crouches, peering back into the living room. Papyrus huddles beneath the long table near the front door, only his muzzle visible through the kitchen entryway.  _ Uuuuh...okay.  _

Grillby crouches next to him. There’s a piece of waffle in his hand—he tosses it gently in Papyrus’ direction. Papyrus’ muzzle scoots forward a few more inches, teeth clicking. After a moment of hesitation, the waffle is snapped up and Papyrus skitters backwards again.  _ Bribery,  _ Grillby says cheerfully.  _ Works every time. Does he like syrup? _

_ Nah. He doesn’t like most strong flavors. _

Grillby slides a plain waffle into a bowl, then scoots it into the living room before turning away again. Sans follows him back over to the counter, hopping onto the little step-stool in front of counter so he can see. (He’d pestered Dad enough when he was little, pushing up on his tiptoes to see over the counter, so that Dad had finally given in and simply bought a step so Sans could always observe what was going on.) Behind him, he hears snuffling—and then, at last, eating. He grins but doesn’t look back; he doesn’t want to startle Papyrus off with the attention.

_ Can I help?  _ he asks Grillby.

_ Certainly. Would you stir these blueberries into the rest of the batter? _

Sans dumps a handful (or two, or three, or five—sue him, he has tiny hands) of blueberries into the bowl of batter, then takes the wooden spoon Grillby offers him and begins to stir. Once it’s mixed, Grillby ladles some into the waffle-maker, where it begins to sizzle gently. As it cooks, Grillby reaches for a packet of bacon. Sans pushes up on his tiptoes, then rocks back on his heels, clinging to the counter to keep his balance. He tugs Grillby’s sleeve.

_ Hey, Grillbz? _

_ Yes? _

_ Can I borrow your phone? _

_ What for? _

_ I wanna call Alphys and let her know we’re back. _

Grillby hands Sans his phone. Sans trots back into the living room, taking a seat underneath the table with Papyrus. He dials Alphys—the phone is set to automatically dial a videofeed, so Grillby can sign—and props it up against the table leg. When Alphys answers, blinking blearily at him, he waves. “Hi, Alphys!”

“Hi, Sans,” Alphys says sleepily. There are heavy bags under her eyes, and she yawns, displaying a fearsome row of teeth. She pauses mid-yawn, does a double-take.  _ “Sans?” _

“Yep.” Sans grins at her. “I just wanted to let you know we’re back in Snowdin now. You should come visit later today. Although, uh—we do have Papyrus with us, and you know how he gets around strangers. We’re trying to keep everything around here kinda chill.”

“Oh my goodness, I’ll be over as s-soon as I can,” Alphys says, scrambling out of her bed. Her pajama shirt has a colorful image of Mew Mew on it. “How long have you been back?”

“Only since last night.”

“And how a-are you all?”

“We’re pretty good. Pap is—” Sans grimaces. “Pretty uncomfy, but I guess that’s normal, after everything that’s happened.”

“Certainly, c-certainly,” Alphys says. “I mean, even in infants, post traumatic stress disorder is a nasty thing. I wouldn’t be surprised i-if—”

“Post what?”

“What?”

“What you said—the post stress thing. You think Pap’s got that?”

“Well, I’m n-no professional—”

“No, but you’re not stupid, Alphys. That’s what you think?”

“It seems likely.” Alphys rubs the back of her neck. “I mean, after everything he’s been through—I think I’d be m-more surprised if he  _ didn’t  _ have it.”

“But there’s a way to get rid of it?” Sans feels better, having a name for what’s wrong with his little brother. Names mean knowledge, and knowledge means power. “It’s not permanent?”

“Er—no, but you’d have to speak to a therapist about that. I’m c-certainly not qualified to give you any a-advice on the subject.”

“Right.” Sans nods earnestly. “Okay. Thanks, Alphys. Oh, um—one more thing.”

“Y-yeah?”

“My dad, he’s—you know. You’ve heard.”

Something bleak and unhappy flickers across her face. “Jackson t-turned him into a blaster. Is that what you’re r-referring to?”

“Mm-hm. So now he can’t sign, and nobody can understand him,” Sans says, frowning. “I know it frustrates him, even if he won’t admit it. Is there any way you could—”

“I am  _ way  _ ahead of you,” Alphys says, padding to her worktable and rummaging through the drawers. For some reason, there are deep clawmarks in her wall. Huh. “C-check this out.” She pulls a small, thin black square from her drawer and brandishes it victoriously.

“Is that what I think it is?” He wiggles in excitement.

“Y-you bet. One Grade A translator, ready to r-rock and roll. It’ll clip onto Dr. Gaster’s j-jaw and translate everything he says into ordinary Common. I know he d-didn’t want to use one before, but if it’s his only option…”

“I think he’ll like it,” Sans says, confident. Dad needs to be able to talk to people without Sans as a middle man—how else is he ever going to get better? Sans knows that Dad’s not comfortable talking about what happened around him. He needs more independence, and that’s exactly what the translator will give him. For all that, though, Sans still hopes it’s a temporary fix. “And—about his blaster form. Would there be any way to—” He peeks around himself, lowers his voice. “You know, change him back?”

Alphys’s face creases with worry. “I’d have to look through Jackson’s notes. Whether or not Dr. Gaster will allow me to is—”

“That doesn’t matter. I can get you whatever notes you need.”

“Sans—”

“Listen, he’ll tell you he doesn’t care, but he  _ does.  _ I know he misses being a normal skeleton. Besides, in a smaller form, he won’t need so much magic. He’ll live longer. It’s  _ literally  _ a life-or-death situation. I’ll get you what you need.”

Alphys hesitates, biting her lip. Then: “...okay. A-alright. I’ll see what I can do. I’ll need any files Jackson has on blaster transformations, or—even better—any files he has s-specifically about what he did to your dad.”

“Got it,” Sans says, setting his jaw. “Just give me a few days.”

“Sans?”

“Hm?”

“D-don’t do anything reckless again. Dr. Gaster couldn’t handle it if something happened to you.  _ None of us  _ could handle it.” 

“Hey, it’s okay,” Sans says, leaning back against the wall. Calm, collected, serene. Nothing bad is going to happen.  _ Nothing.  _ “I’ll be fine, promise. You don’t need  _ tibia  _ worried about me.”

Alphys snorts. “Right. Just—be c-careful, okay? Your dad will literally kill me if anything happens to you.”

“C’mon, he’s a big softie, he wouldn’t do anything but grouch at you.” ...at least, before Jackson, Sans would have believed that. But it doesn’t matter, because nothing bad is going to happen, and Sans is going to fix his dad! “I’ll see you this afternoon, Alph.”

“S-see you, Sans.”

Sans hangs up, breathing a sigh of relief. “See, bro?” he says, glancing down at Papyrus. Papyrus looks miserably back at him, waffle crumbs on his snout. Sans reaches out and brushes them off. “Dad’ll be back to normal in no time. He’ll be okay again.”

Before long, he hears the floor creak overhead, and Dad pads down the stairs and flops down in the living room. Grillby slides a bowl full of waffles and bacon in front of him, and Dad wags his tail gratefully before digging in. Sans, too, grabs a plate of food and gets to work devouring it.

Once Sans is finished, he sets his plate in the sink and then heads back into the living room. He flops back onto the couch, leaning against Grillby, and flicks on the TV—but as he does, his eyes are drawn to the scabbard balanced on  _ top  _ of the TV, carefully out of the way of any adventurous puppies. “Can I see that?” he asks, pointing. 

_ Bring her over here,  _ Grillby says.  _ Carefully, please. _

Dad picks up the sword for him, lowering it so Sans can grasp it by the hilt. He drags it back over to Grillby (it’s longer than Sans is tall) and climbs onto the sofa again. Grillby gently takes it from him, turning the scabbard over in his hands with a certain slow affection. (It’s almost, Sans thinks, the same way he touched Dad when he was smoothing the frost from his bones last night.) “Did you use that?” Sans asks. “Against the humans?”

_ I did. Her name is Wermut—in Common, we would call her Wormwood. _

“Wormwood?”

_ Yes.  _ Grillby touches the hilt reverently.  _ From Revelations. ‘The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water—the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter.’ _

“Sounds...ominous.”

Grillby crackles quietly.  _ So it was. Her sister sword was a blade named Vermouth. Unfortunately, Vermouth was lost before we moved to the Underground. _

“Did you kill lots of humans?”

“Sans,” Dad says sharply. “That’s not poli—”

_ No, no, it’s alright,  _ Grillby signs. He flickers dark blue at the edges.  _ He’s only curious. I killed many humans, Sans. War is a means of death and destruction and little else. _

“Do you think they’re bad? The humans?” He thinks of what Toriel said—of the moral conflict that breathes, now, between his ribs.

_ No. Not all of them. Not even most of them. _

“Then how come you fought?”

_ I did what I had to in order to secure the safety of my family and my people. And even in that— _ Grillby’s flames die back, darken.  _ I failed. _

“Grillby—” Dad leans forward, pressing his snout to Grillby’s head. “That’s enough. Don’t think about it any longer. Everything is alright now; why dwell on the past?”

Grillby wraps his arms around Dad’s muzzle and doesn’t respond—not, Sans supposes, that he understood anyway. For a time, they’re quiet. When Grillby leans back, his flames burn brighter again, and he stands.  _ Would you like to see Wermut in all her shining glory? _

“Do you even need to ask?” Sans asks, scooting onto the edge of the sofa earnestly. 

Grillby stands, strapping the scabbard to his hip. He looks very intimidating, in his red plaid sweatpants and his oversized white t-shirt (which sports a teddy bear on the front of it—a gift from Belous, no doubt). He steps away from the three of them before drawing his sword. It doesn’t gleam the way Sans thought it would. In fact, to his eye, it seems rather dull and plain. Even so, there isn’t a single speck of rust on the blade, and it’s immaculately sharp. The hilt is black, molded leather. Simple. Effective. Designed not for beauty but for its singular purpose: killing.

A shudder runs down Sans’ back.

_ Would you like to see a party trick?  _ Grillby asks.  _ It’s not much use in an actual fight, but it looks cool. _

“You had me at party.”

Grillby steps back into the kitchen, dipping his fingers into the bacon grease still on the stovetop. His hand immediately crackles up, burning more viciously, and he traces his fingers down the blade. He leaves a line of fire in his wake.  _ If we fire elementals wanted to intimidate the enemy, we’d often douse our blades in grease and set them on fire. It poses little mechanical advantage in a battle—actually, it’s a disadvantage, as it immediately cauterizes any wound it makes—but it does have a psychological effect. _

“Well I, for one, am psychologically affected,” Sans decides, peering intently at the sword as the flames peter out. Grillby wipes the blade down, then sheathes it again. “That’s super awesome.”

_ Thank you, Sans. Ah, I suppose I’d best be going, though.  _ He crouches, ruffling a hand across Sans’ skull. His flames tickle.  _ I’m already late to open the bar—the dogs will be wondering where I am, and Fuku will be up soon. Shall I tell them you’ve returned? _

“Not yet,” Dad says, and Sans translates for him.

_ Very well. Would you mind if I came back over tonight to check on you? I’ll bring dinner. _

“Bribery,” Dad says. “Always with the bribery.”

“Always.” Sans beams at him. “You know I’m down for your bribes, Grillbz.”

_ I’m glad to hear it. I’ll bring something for you, too, Wings—and you, little Papyrus.  _ He kneels next to the couch, waving carefully at the tiny pup hidden beneath it.  _ Best of luck adjusting to your new home. I’ll let you have your peace, now. _

Once Grillby leaves, Papyrus squirms out from under the couch and sniffs around the ground he’d walked on. Sans leaves him to it, moving back into the kitchen. He kicks the step-stool over to the sink, then hops up onto it and gets to work washing the dishes. As has become the norm in the past month, Papyrus is too young to do normal housework, and Dad’s form isn’t really suited to it. Sans is fine with that. Really.

Dad is...less so.

“I can do it.” Dad pushes his front half into the kitchen. “Go play with Papyrus.”

“Uh—” Sans eyes his dad’s paws; he doubts they’ll even  _ fit  _ in the sink, let alone around a tiny, fragile ceramic dish. “No, seriously, I’ve got it.  _ You  _ go play with Papyrus.”

“Sans.” Dad levels him with A Look. “I’m the adult. I appreciate that you’re trying to take responsibility, but  _ I’m  _ supposed to be taking care of  _ you.  _ If I want you to do chores, I’ll tell you. Now go play.”

“If you say so, old man.” Sans holds his hands up in surrender, then squeezes back out of the kitchen and leaves him to it. He flops onto his belly on the rug, and Papyrus trots over to sniff his face. “Hey, bud,” he says. “What’s up? Do you wanna watch some cartoons?”

He grabs the remote and flicks the TV to a channel playing Blue’s Clues. Papyrus winces away from the noise, taking shelter under the couch again—but as the episode continues to play, he begins to relax. His eyes follow the colors and movements with interest, and Sans even sees his tail wag once. It’s definitely a hit. 

In the kitchen, he hears a plate shatter. Dad growls, low and subsonic, and Papyrus’ eyes narrow. He creeps out from under the couch, placing himself protectively between Sans and the kitchen.

“You, uh—you sure you don’t want help in there?” Sans asks.

“I’m sure,” Dad grumbles. His tail flicks in irritation, and Papyrus’ eyes snap to it. He crouches, pushes his haunches up and waggles his rump. Prime pouncing position. 

“Do that again.”

“Do what again?”

“Move your tail.”

Dad flops his tail to the other side. Papyrus pounces, slapping his paws down on the tip of Dad’s tail and snapping his teeth at it—there’s a certain gentleness to his movements, though. His spines lay flat, and he makes no threat-sound; he’s playing. Sans’ eyes shine. Dad huffs with amusement, and he sits and lets Papyrus chew on his tail as he struggles to wash the dishes. When Papyrus releases him, he flicks his tail again, and Papyrus springs.

That afternoon, when the dishes are washed and Papyrus is curled up in Sans’ lap watching Little Einsteins, there’s a knock on the door. Dad’s head jerks up (he’d been resting comfortably on the floor, his head on he couch) and he clicks his teeth anxiously. “It’s probably Alphys,” Sans says, gently nudging Papyrus out of his lap and heading for the door. “I invited her over. She’s got a present for youuu—”

“She’s got what now.”

Sans flings the door open, and Alphys squeals and opens her arms. He throws himself into them, hugging her tightly. “Hi, Alphys,” he says, beaming. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too,” Alphys says, patting his skull with one rough, scaly palm. “S-so much, you have no idea. And y-you too, Dr. Gaster!”

Dad thumps his tail on the floor. Papyrus makes his way to the underside of the couch. Alphys’ eyes widen when she sees him, and she crouches behind the couch, peeking under it. 

“That’s P-Papyrus, huh?” she asks. She’d seen the pup before, a few days before he’d led the plunge into Snowdin Forest to find their father—but it had a brief and harried meeting, at best.

“Yep, that’s him. He’s the coolest,” Sans says. “But we try not to bother him when he’s under there. It’s kind of his safe space.”

“C-certainly.” Alphys straightens and moves away from the couch. “Is he friendly?”

“Uuuh—” Sans scratches the back of his neck. “He’s not  _ mean,  _ but I don’t think he really knows how to be nice to strangers. He shouldn’t bite you or anything, though, unless you scare him.”

“Noted. Oh! B-but, here—I should give this to you before I wait any longer.” She fumbles through her coat pockets, then pulls out a small box wrapped in festive purple paper. She sets it down in front of Dad, who sniffs curiously at it. “I know you didn’t want one when you could sign, but without that—well, m-maybe this can be a temporary solution.”

Dad’s eyes widen, and he carefully slices through the paper with a talon, peeling it back. He opens the box, then stares at the little translator. “Is this—?”

Sans nods quickly, bouncing on his toes. “Mm-hm! Alphys made it for you. You just put it on your jaw and it’ll translate everything you say into normal Common.”

“It adjusts itself to match your volume, and tone, a-and rate of speech, and, um, everything,” Alphys says, clasping her hands in front of her chest. “D-do you like it…?”

Dad’s tail thumps the floor so hard the TV rattles. “I love it,” he says, cradling the translator gently in his paws. “Thank you, Alphys,  _ thank you.  _ Oh—ask her to put it on, please, Sans.”

Sans translates, and Alphys beams, stepping forward to take the translator. Dad rests his head on the floor, parting his jaws. Alphys gently sets the box near the back of his lower jaw, wrapping a velcro strap just behind Dad’s last molar. She snugs the band, then steps back. Dad clicks his jaws together. “How is that?” she asks. “It might be a little uncomfortable, at first—ideally, it would go on your neck, but I figured you wouldn’t, um, really enjoy that—”

“No,” Dad says, shaking his head. The translator picks up his word and spits it back out—it doesn’t sound quite like him, but it’s  _ Common,  _ and it means he can communicate again. His tail begins to wag once more. Sans hasn’t seen him look this thrilled in a long while; not since Papyrus first playbowed to him, more than likely. “This is perfect, Alphys. Thank you very, very much. You’ve no idea how much this means to me.”

“I’m more than happy to help,” Alphys says, patting the translator affectionately before stepping back. “So, now that you can talk—how have you all been?”

She takes a seat on the touch, fiddling with the end of her tail, and Dad tells her about their stay in the Ruins—about his loss of magic, about Papyrus’ soul transfusion, about his work on Toriel’s house and (very briefly, and very clinically) about what happened in Jackson’s lab. It’s the most Sans has heard him speak since Jackson kidnapped him. In return, Alphys tells him about the state of affairs in the capital and Hotland, about the scientists and guards who’ve been working to gather the evidence in Jackson’s lab, about the reluctant stirring of the Judge. Sans listens the whole time, rapt.

Once their stories and smalltalk have been traded, Alphys helps Gaster prepare lunch. They have grilled cheeses and pear slices—Sans is pleased to notice that Papyrus seems to genuinely enjoy the grilled cheese. Sans pours him a bottle of milk, then lays down on the floor and holds the bottle underneath the couch. He’s gotten into the habit of bottle-feeding Papyrus, more often than not, and it always seems to help relax him. He hopes that the familiar ritual will help him relax in his new home, too.

It takes a few minutes, but eventually, Papyrus begins to drink.

Dad watches him jealously. 

“What?” Sans asks. 

“Nothing.”

“No, it’s definitely something. You’ve got a look.”

“That’s just my face.”

“No it’s not. I know your face, silly. This is a different face. What’s up?”

“It’s just—I wish I could do that,” Dad grumbles. “I feel as though you’re more of a parent to him than I am.”

“Well, c’mere.” Sans motions him over, then sticks the bottle between Dad’s molars. “There. Try now.”

“This is stupid.”

“Can’t hurt to try.”

Dad reluctantly lowers his head, pressing the side of his muzzle to the edge of the couch. For a long time, Papyrus doesn’t move—and then, several minutes into one of Alphys’ animes, Sans hears him begin to drink again. Dad glows (figuratively). Alphys squeals under her breath, clasping her hands to her cheeks. 

“Oh my g-god,” she whispers. “He’s so cute.”

“Yeah.” Sans beams. “He’s really great.”

“How’d you meet him?”

Sans swings his legs over the side of the couch, humming. “In the lab. Jackson put me in the same room as him. Believe it or not, he’s actually improved a lot, since then.”

“I believe it. Y-you’re gonna be a great big brother, Sans.”

This time, it’s Sans who does the glowing (figuratively). He opens his mouth to respond, but before he can, several short, excited howls echo down the street. His throat tightens with the urge to respond to them, but he swallows it, heading for the window. He presses his face to the glass and peers outside, his breath fogging the glass. He sees a flash of black and white, a flash of cream—the pack.

A second later, and there’s a hammering knock at the door. 

“Sans—” Dad starts. “Not with Papyrus.”

“I know, I know.” Sans swings the door open and is quite immediately swarmed by a pack of furry, slobbering, very enthusiastic dogs. Most of them are repeating his name with various tones of relief and excitement. He laughs and pets their ears, their shoulders, their heads. It’s only when they start to plunge further into the room that his delight with them retreats some. “Hey, guys, hold on a second—”

“Dr. Gaster!” Doggo cries, leaping quite eagerly and quite directly at Dad’s face. Dad jerks back, the bottle clattering to the floor. There’s an anxious hiss from underneath the couch. Greater Dog immediately sticks his nose underneath it, his tail wagging violently. Papyrus scrambles out on the other side of the couch, stumbling backwards, his eyes wide. He glimpses Sans out of the corner of his eye—

He glimpses Sans, surrounded by strangers, and his demeanor changes drastically. 

He arches his back, bristles his spines. His claws sink into the carpet. His tail lashes furiously behind him; he arcs his neck, clicks his lower jaw in warning. A low, dangerous growl rumbles from the pit of his chest. The dogs freeze.

“Out,” Dad demands, shaking Doggo off of his muzzle. “All of you, out, now.”

The Dogi carefully rise to stand on their hind legs, and Papyrus falters. Sans expects him to retreat—he looks like he’s about to, his tail dropping, but then he looks at Sans again, and he snaps his jaws with an ominous  _ clack  _ of noise. His bones begin to rattle. The Dogi back up, herding the rest of their pack back with them—save Doggo, who finds himself stuck on the other side of the couch with Dad.

“Uh—didn’t know the pup had gotten to be aggressive,” Doggo says. “Wasn’t he just cowering around, last time?”

“Yes, well,  _ last time  _ he didn’t have a bunch of strangers bursting into his home and climbing all over his brother,” Dad snips, headbutting Doggo forward. “Outside, you. I won’t be held accountable for it if he bites.”

Doggo slinks past Papyrus, his tail and ears held low. Papyrus doesn’t look satisfied by that—more than likely, he wants Doggo on his back, tail tucked and belly up. Sans steps between them. Papyrus prowls forward, leaning against his legs. He keeps his head low but his tail up, his spines lifted. 

“It’s...really nice to see you guys?” Sans tries. 

“No,” Dad says, padding forward and thrusting his head out of the door after the pack. Sans winces. That’s the Scolding Voice. “It  _ isn’t.  _ What are you thinking, running inside like that? You knew we had Papyrus with us. He isn’t well. He’s not aggressive, but by the  _ stars,  _ if you trample all over his home and his family, what do you  _ think  _ is going to happen? Honestly! You’re strangers to him. He isn’t like Sans was. His socialization is  _ shit,  _ and so is his training. You need to be more careful. I don’t want him to hurt any of you, but if you continue to carry on like a bunch of rambunctious puppies, he’ll be justified in doing it. I appreciate that you’re excited for our return, but we need a calm environment, at the moment, and a whole pack of dogs isn’t exactly conducive to that.”

“Dr. Gaster—” Dogaressa tries.

“I’m not  _ finished  _ yet,” Dad says, undoubtedly peeved. His tail flicks precariously close to the TV, the spikes on the tip flaring. “How did you even find out we were back? Oh, you smelled us all over Grillby, I suppose. But did that give you any right to come over here and run amuck? An open door is not an invitation, mind you. Didn’t your parents teach you any manners? If you should like to say hello, you shall do it politely and quietly and from  _ outside  _ the house. We have a one-guest rule at the moment, and right now, that slot is filled by Dr. Alphys. You may come back tomorrow.”

“But Dr. Gaster—”

“That’s quite enough. I’m going to close the door now, because you have distressed my child, and he needs time and space to calm himself back down—which is  _ not  _ an easy  _ fucking  _ task. Good  _ day.”  _ Dad jerks his head back inside, then slams the door shut. 

“Um,” Sans says.

“Uh,” Alphys agrees.

“That was too harsh, wasn’t it?” Dad says, rubbing his forehead. “Damn it. I didn’t mean to be that cross with them—but  _ really.  _ They can’t just trample all over someone else’s house.”

There’s a knock at the door.

Dad snarls and whips around, fumbling with the doorknob. “Sans—”

“Got it.” Sans opens the door, pushes it forward, and—

“Asgore?” Dad demands. 

Asgore smiles sheepishly at him, rubbing the back of his neck. Dogaressa curls at his feet, wagging her tail apologetically. “Hello, Wingdings. I already heard your spiel from down the street, so I’ll mind myself and stay outside, but—goodness, I just had to see you once the dogs told me you were back.” He opens his arms. “Could you spare a hug for an old friend?”

Dad sighs, but there’s a touch of fondness to the sound. He leans forward, pushing his snout against Asgore’s chest. Asgore wraps his arms around Dad’s muzzle, rubbing beneath his chin. “Glad to see you,” Dad mumbles.

“Not as glad as I am to see you,” Asgore says, leaning his forehead against Dad’s. “We’ve got a lot to talk about, little one, but it can wait until you’re all settled back in. How are you doing? Can I do anything for you?”

“No,” Dad says. “We’re alright.”

“Wingdings,” Asgore says, chastising.

“...I’ll let you know if I think of anything.”

“Thank you.” He releases Dad, then kneels and opens his arms for Sans. “And what about you, little man? Have you a hug for me?”

Sans nods earnestly, skirting around Papyrus (who looks distinctly unhappy about such an act) and diving into Asgore’s arms. Asgore squeezes him tightly, patting the back of his skull. Sans winds his arms around the king’s neck, breathing in the scent of him, of potting soil and warm goat. “Missed you,” he mumbles into Asgore’s fur. 

“As I missed you,” Asgore says, his voice a low, comforting rumble. “It’s good to have you all back home again. Remy’s been missing you, too. I’ll bring him along once you’re all settled in, how’s that? And how is your brother?”

“Er—not great,” Sans admits, glancing back at Papyrus. He’s slunk to stand between Dad’s front legs, glowering at Dogaressa. “He’ll get better, though.”

“He certainly will. He’s got the whole Underground rooting for him, after all!” Asgore releases him, standing and straightening up. He sets a hand on Dad’s muzzle. “Now, I’ll leave you be for the rest of the day, Wingdings, but I expect we’ll have a long conversation very soon. Let me know when you’re ready.”

Even Sans can tell that’s not a request.

Dad inclines his head. “As you wish, Your Majesty. Feel free to call later tonight, if you’d just like to chat—I can talk now.” He points almost giddily at his translator. “Look what Alphys made.”

“Why, well done, Dr. Alphys,” Asgore says, waving at her over Dad’s head. “We may just have to promote you after all.”

“Yes,” Dad agrees, an odd look flickering across his face. “We may just.”

“Be seeing you, my dears,” Asgore says, stepping back into the street. Dogaressa trots after him, then lopes towards her pack, who have clustered next to the mailbox. “Have a good day. You know who to call if you need absolutely anything—I’ll keep the press off your case for a while, hm?”

“I’d b-best be going, too,” Alphys says, scurrying towards the door. “L-let you get Papyrus settled again—but it was very nice to see you all again. Let me know if the translator gives you any, um, trouble, okay? It’s just a prototype.”

“Well,” Dad says, nudging Sans affectionately. “Prototypes have turned out pretty well in my experience, you know.”

“And it’s a good thing, too,” Sans says, scooping Papyrus up. “God knows where you’d be without us, old man.”

Better off, probably. The thought is a bitter bite in the back of Sans’ mind.

“God knows,” Dad agrees, shutting the door, “but I’m glad I don’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: i rewrote gaster and grillby's reunion way,,,way too many times,,,


	23. nystagmus effect

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: symptoms of ptsd (nightmares, anxiety, brief flashback), references to child abuse/neglect, brief medical procedures

When Gaster wakes up, Sans and Papyrus are curled up in his bed. It has become, over the past few days, something of an unfortunate habit. The two will fall asleep in Sans’ bed and then, inevitably, make their way to Gaster’s room some time in the night. In one way, it’s a relief to wake up and see his boys immediately, safe and sound. It certainly eases his anxiety about leaving them alone.

On the other hand, he knows it’s not healthy for them. Papyrus almost certainly has separation anxiety; Sans is better at hiding it, but it’s not out of the question for him, either. (Or, to be fair, for Gaster himself.) A therapist’s consultation will be needed, and soon. Gaster hasn’t been able to pry either of them outside of the house yet, however. The townspeople are more than willing to prepare whatever meals he needs (his fridge is full of casseroles again) and the outside world clearly distresses Papyrus. Gaster himself is at a loss. He knows his youngest needs to be socialized, but he’s not sure how to go about it in a perfectly safe way. Papyrus is the lethal weapon Gaster always thought Sans was—and he’s not friendly, either.

Changing that is going to be difficult.

He’s starting today, he decides in the face of his fear—for better or for worse.

“Morning, little one,” he murmurs when Papyrus’ eyes open shortly before dawn. The child doesn’t sleep much, and when he does, it’s always troubled and fleeting. He yawns and pushes his paws against Gaster’s muzzle as he stretches. Gaster nuzzles him affectionately, and Papyrus huffs but allows it. Sans stirs, curling up around his little brother and cracking an eye open. “And good morning to you too, slightly-larger-one.”

Sans murmurs something incomprehensible and squeezes Papyrus.

“I think we’re going to the park after breakfast, this morning.”

_ That  _ wakes Sans up. “You’re doing what now?”

_ “We’re  _ doing what now. We’re going to the park. It’s wide enough that Papyrus shouldn’t feel trapped, and this early in the day, I doubt many people are there. He needs to start adjusting to the outside world, and he’s not going to be able to do that if we keep him cooped up in here.”

“But he’s still adjusting to being  _ here,”  _ Sans protests. “In the house.”

“He’s had enough time for that.”

“It took him  _ weeks  _ to get used to being at Toriel’s. It’s only been a few days.”

“I know.” Gaster lifts his head, stretching as much as he can in the cramped quarters of his bedroom. “He’s not fully adjusted, but we can’t give him weeks to adjust to everything. The sooner we start his socialization, the better off he’ll be. You understand that, don’t you? I know you want to protect him, but this is for the best.”

Sans sighs, petting Papyrus’ skull. “Yeah. I guess.”

“Don’t sound so thrilled about it.”

“Hmph.”

After breakfast, Gaster steps outside of the house and finally,  _ finally  _ straightens to his full height. He shakes himself off, fanning his spikes and flexing his claws into the snow. He’s struck with the sudden, ridiculous urge to run up and down the street simply to burn off this  _ energy  _ that writhes in his bones after so long being cooped up. Sans steps out after him, followed by Papyrus, who never strays more than a few feet from his brother. He’s swaddled in Sans’ old striped coat and hat, and he looks mightily unhappy about it.

(It’s safer, though—this way he can’t twist and snap and chase, and if he bristles his spines, at least they’ll have to tear through the jacket before they tear through someone’s hand.)

Gaster leads the way to the park, although he has to consciously shorten his stride to keep pace with his much tinier children. He’d offer them a ride, but he gets the feeling that they both have energy to burn, too. Papyrus keeps his head and tail low, looking warily around himself as he slinks down the road. He sticks close to Sans’ side, but he doesn’t look quite as disgruntled as Gaster thought he would. At the very least, Jackson seems to have accustomed him to Snowdin—somewhat, anyhow. Papyrus still shrinks away if he sees another monster, placing himself unsubtly between that monster and Sans. He doesn’t look  _ comfortable,  _ by any means, but at the very least he isn’t panicking.

Most of the monsters they pass aren’t paying attention to his boys, anyhow—they’re paying attention to him. (To him and his grotesque, cracked new form.) He tries his best to ignore their stares, but they still sting. He doesn’t want to be this way. He  _ didn’t ask for this.  _ Shame bubbles in his throat, and it is with great relief that he sinks into the relative safety of the park. It’s surrounded by low hedges, and he sprawls out along one, trying to hide himself. 

“Go on,” he says to his boys, who hover by his tail. “Go play. And Sans—” He glances out at the snowy playground. As expected, this early in the morning, it’s empty. “—if anyone else comes, bring Papyrus back over here, alright?”

“‘kay.” Sans kicks the snow with his boot. “You don’t wanna come play with us?”

“Perhaps in a little while. I want to watch Papyrus, first.”

“Don’t make him sound like a science experiment or anything.”

“Ah.” Gaster grimaces, then heaves himself to his paws. “No, you’re right. I’ll come along with you. What do you want to play on first?”

Sans heads for the swings, hopping into one. This, Gaster is pleased to realize, is something he can still participate in. He uses his muzzle to push Sans forward on the swing, and Sans gradually begins to relax and swing his legs. Papyrus flops onto the snow some distance away, watching them both with an expression of utter bafflement. 

“Hey Paps, wanna see a cool trick?” Sans asks, grinning down at the pup as he swings backwards. “Can I do that thing, Dad?”

“If you feel up for it.” He gives Sans one more big push forward. As soon as Sans reaches the peak of his swing, he kicks his legs forward and pushes the swing back. He flails midair for a moment, and then turns his own soul blue and shifts the gravity around himself. He doesn’t completely stop his fall, but he does slow it significantly. He more or less floats to the ground, twisting midair so he can hook his arms behind his head and lounge on the magical currents he creates. 

Papyrus stares, his mouth open. 

After that, the two of them race to the slides. Gaster crouches at the bottom of each one as his sons slide down it, catching them in his paws. Papyrus shrinks away from the slide, the first time, but he’s quick to follow after Sans—he drags his claws through the soft plastic and he whines and whimpers and goes down headfirst, but he  _ does  _ make it. They start with the little slides and work up to the bigger ones, and by the time they’ve gone through all of them, Papyrus wags his tail and leaps forward each time Sans calls him down.

By the time they make it to the monkey bars, Papyrus is panting—for once, not with fear but with genuine exertion. It’s good to see. Perhaps with less energy, he’ll find himself less fearful; at the very least, he should sleep better tonight. Sans teaches him to climb all over the bars, and Gaster lays on his back underneath them, just in case either one of them falls. Papyrus sticks his head between two of the bars and offers him a concerned whuff, his claws splayed and tail flicking to keep his balance.

“I’m alright, little one,” Gaster says, reaching up to tap Papyrus’ nose gently with a claw. “Just resting.”

Papyrus bounds across the rest of the bars with ease—he’s extremely well-coordinated, for a yearling (and one with a warped spine, at that). He springs from the top of the bars, and Sans pings his soul blue only long enough to ease the strain on his joints when he lands. He trots over to Gaster, nosing curiously at him. Fortunately, this time he doesn’t bite. 

“Good job,” Gaster says, wagging his tail. Papyrus dances his front paws slightly, excited by the positive response. He continues to nose along Gaster’s ribs, clearly still baffled by the fact that someone can lay on their back  _ without  _ being beaten into it. Gaster lays still and lets him do what he will; he isn’t one to grow bored easily. Sans eventually calls Papyrus, and it’s only that which pries him away from Gaster’s side.

The two of them hop onto the merry-go-round (or, more precisely, Sans hops onto the merry-go-round; Papyrus whines until his brother picks him up) and Gaster pushes them gently. Papyrus sways and splays his claws, dizzy within the first few moments, so Gaster relents and lets him hop off. He huddles up next to Gaster instead, watching as he pushes Sans around and around. By the time Sans pleads mercy, he stumbles when he walks.

“Look,” Gaster says, pointing to Sans’ eyelights. They jump erratically from one side to the other, subtle little movements as his body tries to reorientate itself. “Nystagmus effect.”

“Ny-what?”

“Nystagmus effect. It’s what happens when you’re trying to balance yourself after you’ve been spinning for a while.”

“Huh. Neat.” Sans beams. “You do it.”

So Gaster squeezes onto the merry-go-round and allows his son to push him around and around (which is, given his weight, no easy feat). When he gets off, he staggers from side to side, his head swaying. “Oof,” he says. “I forgot how much I hated that.”

“Lemme see, lemme  _ see.” _

He stoops and lets Sans peer at his eyelights, trying to open his slumped right eye as much as he can.

“Woah,” Sans says. “That  _ is  _ cool. Nystagmus!”

“Nystagmus,” Gaster agrees.

The seesaw is next, followed closely by the climbing wall. After that, his boys take to simply racing around the playground in a classic game of tag. Gaster seizes this opportunity to longue next to the hedge. He discovers that if he rubs his side against it, it scratches his itches very nicely. So nicely, in fact, that his hind leg gets the sudden urge to thump, thump, thump against the ground. He resists the urge.

“Sans!” 

He startles at the shout, his spines bristling instinctively. When he looks, he sees Fuku racing towards the playground, followed closely by two of Erika’s children—one of whom had been responsible for the shout. He searches desperately for Grillby (this is clearly a two-dad situation) but his elemental is nowhere to be found. Gaster heaves himself to his feet, eyeing Papyrus warily.

“Fuku! Thomas, Sasha—” Sans’ eyes shine and he beams, but he holds a hand out as she nears him. “Hey, um—hold a second, okay? Pap isn’t—”

Fuku skids to a stop a few feet away. She lifts her hands to sign.  _ I know. Dad told me. I’ll be super careful, and so will they.  _ She ruffles the bunnies’ ears gently.  _ Just tell us what to do. _

“Uh—right, okay.” Sans sets his jaw, determined. Papyrus stands in front of him, leaning hard against his legs. He doesn’t seem aggressive quite yet—he’s still got his head and tail low, his spines flat. “Just don’t make any sudden movements, and don’t grab him, or me, or—well, don’t touch him at all, really. He’s not mean, but he gets scared really easily. Don’t shout, or tell him what to do, or stand over him.”

“Okie-dokie,” the bunnies chorus. 

Fuku nods earnestly.  _ So what do you want to play first? _

“How about the swings?” Sans offers. The five of them bound back towards the swings—well, four of them bound, and Papyrus slinks warily after them. He casts a worried glance over his shoulder at Gaster, and Gaster wags his tail encouragingly. If Papyrus can get along with strangers acting in a non-threatening manner (without hiding under something, even!), then they’re already miles ahead of where Gaster thought they were.

And if that’s the case, then he has no excuse to keep putting off what needs to be done. He’ll need to call Dr. Yeoman tonight.

As the children swing, Papyrus lays cautiously a few feet away. The swings were a good first choice—they give him a chance to simply observe these strange new creatures from a safe distance, to adjust to the new sights and smells and noises. Sans is a clever boy. He shows off his floating trick again, to much applause, and then pings the other kids’ souls blue so they, too, can practice controlled falling. 

Once they’ve exhausted themselves playing on the swings, they head for the slides again. Sans coaxes Papyrus into going down one, catching him in his arms at the bottom and hugging him close. Papyrus twists his head to keep an eye on the strangers, more or less ignoring his brother’s praise and squirming to be put down. He hides under the slides as the other children play above him, looking determinedly uncomfortable.

Gaster sets his head on his paws and mourns for another lost childhood.

(He thinks of Jackson, briefly, and his claws leave gouges in the snow.)

By early afternoon, Papyrus isn’t doing much better. He doesn’t flee from the children, and he doesn’t attack them, but he doesn’t willingly interact with them, either. Still—at least he’s getting used to them. All things in good time. Gaster’s metaphorical stomach starts to rumble, so he supposes it must be time for lunch. He pushes himself to his feet, stretching leisurely (it feels so  _ good  _ to be outside and uncramped by walls) and preparing to call his children. Just as he does, something touches his hock. He jumps and whips around, snarling—the children freeze, their eyes wide.

_...hello.  _ Grillby blinks at him.

Gaster buries his snout into the snow.

“Jumpy much, pops?” Sans teases from across the playground. The children laugh, their tension broken, and return to their games—or, in Fuku’s case, her phone.

_ Indeed,  _ Grillby signs, reaching out to smooth a hand across his skull.  _ You do seem jumpy. Have you seen someone about it yet? _

Gaster groans.

_ You ought to think consider it. Therapy helped me, after the war. But that’s not what I came for. Here.  _ He sets down the hefy paper bag he’s carrying.  _ I brought lunch. _

“You’re too good,” Gaster says, sniffing the bag. It smells like warm potatoes—like fries. The children flock to it with their uneering sense of  _ food is here.  _ Papyrus huddles close to Gaster’s paw, looking miserably at him. 

_ Hey,  _ Fuku signs, tapping Sans’ knee as he chows down on a turkey sandwich and hot cocoa.  _ Can I try feeding Papyrus? _

Sans’ brow furrows as he considers it.  _ Sure. It’s not like he can actually bite your hand, right? _

_ Exactly.  _ Fuku grabs a fry, offering it to Papyrus, who shrinks away. She looks away from him and waits patiently, digging into her own lunch. Papyrus glances nervously from her to Sans to Gaster. Both Sans and Gaster offer him encouraging looks, but neither one offers him a command. He leans forward, sniffing the fry tentatively before jerking back again.

_ So, how have you children been?  _ Grillby asks.

Fuku flashes him a thumbs up.

“Super good!” one of the bunnies says—the one with the white patch on her nose. Uuuh, what’s her name? Sans had just said it—oh, Sasha, yes, that’s it. “We played on the swings, and the slides, and—”

As the children regale Grillby with their adventures, Gaster munches on his serving of fries—a much larger server than anyone else’s, since he is the size of a small mountain and very salty about it. When he glances back over, Papyrus munches on the fry Fuku offered him. Gaster kneads the snow with delight. His baby boy is growing  _ up— _

He hopes, suddenly, that he lives long enough to see them both grown and stable and happy. He wants them to be happy. He wants them to be okay, even after he’s gone.

Once they’ve finished eating, the children run back towards the playground. Gaster helps jam their abandoned napkins and empty to-go cups into the paper bag, then sits next to Grillby and watches as their kids play. There is no sight more peaceful, more contenting. It soothes the constant ache of fear and anger in his soul more than anything else can.

_ Wings. _

Gaster cocks his head.

_ I need to talk to you. _

Gaster glares at his paws. Fuck. Well, he has some magic to spare now. Surely a few words wouldn’t hurt…? He manifests a pair of hands, holding his breath and waiting for them to glitch out of existence. When they remain stable, a wash of relief floods down his back, and he begins to sign along with his words. “By all means, then, talk, but we’ll have to do it quickly. I don’t know how long these hands will last.”

_ No, I need to  _ talk  _ to you. Away from the children. I don’t want to make a scene. _

Gaster winces. “Well, get in line.”

_ I’m serious. _

“So am I. Half of the Underground wants to scold me to hell and back, so—”

_ It isn’t just that. _

“No, but you can’t say that’s not  _ most  _ of it. And it’s nothing unwarranted,” Gaster admits. “You’ve a right to say what you need to say, and I’ll let you have that right. But—leaving the children alone, it’s not something I can do right now, not so soon. I’m going to have Dr. Yeoman come out to the house tomorrow, I think, and then I’ll need to set up their therapy consults—”

_ And yours. _

“—and go and see Asgore about the Judgement. He’ll probably seize that opportunity to take  _ his  _ turn scolding me. I’ll need to go and see Thresh at some point, because to be quite honest, I’m rather tired of walking around naked. I’m just booked. I promise I’ll speak with you, though, and honestly, as soon as I can.”

Grillby sighs softly.  _ Very well. But answer me these questions, at least. _

“Anything.”

_ Are you stuck like this?  _ He gestures to Gaster’s ugly form.

“I—don’t know.” Gaster glances away. The fog curls and flutters densely above their heads. “This form wasn’t created the way Sans’ and Papyrus’ were. It stands to reason that it can’t be altered the way theirs can, either, but I’ve yet to do any DNA testing to prove it. Perhaps I shall, once I get back to the lab, but I’m not going to hold out hope. Why? Does it—” He shuffles his paws in the snow. “Does it bother you very much?”

_ No! No, nothing like that.  _ Grillby sets a warm hand on his elbow.  _ You’re still  _ you.  _ That’s all that matters.  _

“Well—” Gaster hovers a paw over his darkened soul. “I wouldn’t be so sure.”

_ You are,  _ Grillby signs firmly.  _ I know you, Wings. Trauma changes you, and an unpleasant change it is, but—you’re still  _ you.  _ Your soul still belongs to you. _

“If anyone would know, I suppose it would be you.” Gaster lowers his head, nudging Grillby affectionately. 

_ Exactly. I’ve been there, done that. So you can trust me when I say that what you’re feeling right now is normal, and okay, and it doesn’t make you a bad person. _

Gaster thinks of his grief, his hopelessness, his fear, and perhaps he can believe that—but then he thinks of his anger, and he...doubts.

_ Second question: these.  _ Grillby traces his hands over the cracks in Gaster’s ulna and radius, the thin fractures that patchwork his ribs and spine.  _ Why are they here? _

“I gave Papyrus a soul. It took more magic than I would have liked it to, so I can’t easily maintain a form this large—but I’m sure we can both agree that it was worth it.” Gaster tilts his head, gazing out as his youngest son, who trots alongside Sans as they head for the merry-go-round. “Look at him.”

_ He’s very nice,  _ Grillby agrees. 

“I’m afraid I can’t take any credit, this time. Did Asgore explain…?”

_ Yes.  _ Grillby’s signs are sharp, now, stiff with anger.  _ He did. If I had my way, I’d burn Jackson alive—and I’d make it fucking  _ slow.

“Grillby—”

_ But of course I won’t have my way.  _ He shrugs.  _ His fate is the Judge’s. I’m not going to apologize for feeling that way, though. _

“Of course not.”

_ And you needn’t, either. _

Gaster laughs. “Me? Don’t be silly. Why would I want to kill  _ him?  _ He’s a perfect little angel, oh,  _ isn’t he.” _

_ No.  _ Grillby somehow manages to convey sarcasm through the movements of his hands—and through a long sideways look at Gaster.  _ You don’t sound vaguely homicidal at all. _

“Anyway, it’s not like it matters. As you said, his fate is the Judge’s. I’m not going to worry about it yet; my only duty is to give what testimony I have.”

_ It matters because it’s hurting you. If you bottle up your anger, you’ll— _

“I’m not bottling up anything. I’m  _ fine,  _ Grillby, honestly. It’s the boys we should be worrying about.”

_ I am worried about them, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be worried about you, too. I’ve got enough worry to go around, trust me. _

“Let’s talk about this later, please.”

Grillby drags his palms down his face, his flames crackling a strange mirage of blue and red. When they blend, they make the most fascinating shade of purple. 

“I’m sorry,” Gaster offers. “I don’t mean to worry you.”

_ It’s fine. You’re right. Let’s just—talk about it later.  _

“Do you have another question?”

_ Yes. What would you like for dinner? _

“Grillby. Grillby, no. There’s no room in the fridge, it’s like playing fucking Tetris, trying to get things in and out—”

_ I’ll make casserole,  _ Grillby threatens.

Gaster groans and scrapes his paws over his muzzle. “No, stars, please spare me. I’m so sick of casseroles.”

_ Enchiladas it is. _

“...yeah, okay, I can handle that—but only if you and Fuku help us finish them.” He points a claw at Grillby. “I’m not playing Fridge Tetris again tonight. I’m not doing it.”

Grillby chuckles.  _ Alright, alright. You’ve convinced me. See you tonight. _

Gaster harrumphs and flicks his tail. 

* * *

That night, after a hearty dinner of enchiladas (substituting sweet potatoes and applesauce for Papyrus, who found enchiladas to be far, far too strong for his tastes), Gaster longues on the living room floor and prepares to dial Dr. Yeoman. His big stupid claws make it a ten-minute process, but eventually the phone begins to ring. The boys are upstairs playing, and he hopes he can finish this conversation before they return. He’d told Sans what he was planning, of course—it wouldn’t do to startle him with a stranger, and one who’s likely to prod and interrogate him, at that. Still, Gaster would rather not discuss their injuries around them. He doesn’t want to bring up bad memories if he can avoid it. 

The phone clicks. “Florence Children’s Hospital, this is Dr. Yeoman speaking.”

“Hello, Dr. Yeoman. This is Dr. Gaster, from—”

“Dr. Gaster!” Dr. Yeoman exclaims. “My  _ lord,  _ I’ve been waiting for a call. What took you so damned long? News of what happened has been all over the capital, and if even half of the rumors I’ve heard are true, you’re all three  _ long  _ overdue for an appointment.”

“I know, I know,” Gaster says, grimacing. “Precisely what I’m calling about. Would you be able to make a housecall sometime tomorrow?”

“For your boys? Of course. I’m free between three and five—would that work?”

“Certainly.”

“And how many will there be? All three of you, I expect.”

“Just the two boys.”

“Right, all three of you.” He hears her scribble something down. He sighs. “What am I going to need to be prepared for? I saw them briefly right before they ran off to find you, but is there anything new?”

“Most of their injuries are minor and healed already—Sans is having trouble with the vision in his right eye, though. I’d also like to get a soul-check done on both of them, and I’d like your opinion on their growth plates. If you could get a scraping from them, that would be ideal. Although I do have to warn you, the new child is—painfully shy. He’s not actively aggressive, but he won’t hesitate to bite, if he feels that Sans is threatened.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Dr. Yeoman says, her voice softening some. “Poor things. Have you spoken to a therapist?”

“No. I wanted to get your recommendation on that, too.”

“I’ll see what I can do. I’d like to get an eye on the both of them before I advise you on anything. Tomorrow, three—we’ve got a date, doc.”

“We certainly do. Goodnight, Dr. Yeoman.”

“Night, Gaster.”

After hanging up the phone, Gaster heads upstairs. He can hear Sans’ voice—reading, it sounds like. When he pokes his head into their bedroom, he finds Papyrus sprawled out on the floor and watching his big brother, rapt. Sans reads  _ Where the Sidewalk Ends.  _ He glances up when Gaster snakes his head into the room, waving. “Heya, pops. Come to join the reading circle?”

“I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather do,” Gaster says, setting his head down before his son. Papyrus inches closer, tapping his snout against Gaster’s. Gaster nuzzles him gently, and he only tenses a  _ tiny  _ bit. It’s a victory.

Sans flips the page and turns it around. There’s a sketch of a little town at the bottom. “‘How much good inside a day? Depends how good you live ‘em. How much love inside a friend? Depends how much you give ‘em….’”

Papyrus listens to the entire book, his eyes all for Sans. He barely glances at the pictures. Gaster lets his own eyes shut, listening to the cadence of his boy’s voice—safe, calm, content. They’re all okay. They’re all going to be okay. He just has to believe that.

He curls up around his bed that night, resting his head on the mattress (it’s naught but a glorified pillow, at this point). He dreams of Jackson reaching between his ribs, curling fingers through his soul and leaving sooty streaks in his wake. Wakes up gasping, sweating, and sicker than he’s been in quite some time. Staggers outside, head low, and vomits into the snow. Black steam curls around his muzzle, tarry soul-rot sticking to his muzzle. His collar chafes and itches and stings when he moves his head too far. He hisses in frustration, bringing his hind leg up and scratching furiously at his neck. He scratches so hard he unbalances himself. Thick gray magic sticks to his hind claws. It stinks of infection.

...what did he do wrong? Why today, of all days? He thought things had gone well. He’d felt fine. He’d been  _ fucking fine.  _ The illogic of it grates against him.

Once he’s stopped retching and scratching and he’s scrubbed the rot from his bones, burying his vomit under piles of snowdrifts, he heads back to his room. His sons curl up together on his bed. Papyrus cracks an eye open and regards him wearily. Gaster wonders when the last time Papyrus really, truly slept was. He curls up on bedroom floor, closes his eyes, and tries to rest. 

After a few moments, Papyrus crawls into the space between his front legs and settles against his chest. Gaster pulls one of his front paws in, curling it protectively around his baby. Papyrus sighs softly and rests his chin on Gaster’s paw. When Gaster finally sleeps again, he does not dream.

That morning, after a meal of breakfast casserole, he explains their afternoon to Sans. “Dr. Yeoman will be here at three,” he says, scrubbing a plate off with one careful claw and the soapy sponge that’s impaled on it. “She’s probably going to look you over and ask you some questions about what happened and how you were hurt. She may also want to know about anything you saw happen to Papyrus.”

“Okay.” Sans swings his legs off of his chair. Papyrus nips cautiously at his untied shoelaces as they flop.

“You’ll be alright with that?”

“Sure.”

“She’ll also scan your souls so we can get a better idea of your stats, since you gave so much magic to Papyrus.”

“Will she be able to fix my eye?”

Gaster hesitates. “Perhaps, but—I’m not going to kid you, Sans. It isn’t likely. If I had gotten you to her sooner, then maybe…”

“It’s fine.” Sans shrugs. “I’m already used to it, anyways. Besides—” He beams, glowing his good eye yellow. “It reminds me of you.”

Gaster’s...not sure if that’s a good thing or not. 

“Hey, hold on a second—” Sans motions him down, so Gaster lowers his head. Tiny fingers brush across his throat, against the sticky ooze above his collar. Sans grimaces and pulls back, heading for the sink to wash his hands. “What did you do? It wasn’t like this yesterday.”

Gaster sighs heavily. “I think it may be infected.”

“It’s because you’ve been scratching.” Sans puts his hands on his hips, scowling. “Tori told you not to do that.”

“I can’t help it,” Gaster protests. “It’s in my sleep, most of the time.”

“Get the doctor to look at it.”

“She’s a pediatric doctor. She doesn’t treat adults.”

“Seriously? Adults aren’t that different. You’re just a little bit bigger.”

“It’s a bit more than that.”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Nuh—”

Gaster headbutts Sans’ chest affectionately, and Sans giggles and grabs his snout. He concedes to let Dr. Yeoman look at it, if only to appease his son. After that, Sans ambles off to watch cartoons with Papyrus (who’s taken a real shine to Disney). Gaster tries to clean their house as best he can, then takes to watching the door anxiously until three ‘o clock rolls around. A knock sounds promptly. Papyrus takes that as his cue to slink beneath the sofa again.

“Good afternoon, Dr. Yeoman,” Gaster says, twisting the doorknob with his magic before swinging it open. (A waste of precious magic, really, but he can’t rely on Sans for everything.)

“Good afternoon!” the chubby little beaver says cheerfully, stepping into the house. She’s not wearing her labcoat, Gaster realizes with relief—he’d been worried about how Papyrus would react to that. Instead, she’s dressed in a thick pink sweater. “You sure have gotten taller since the last time I saw you.”

“Yes,” Gaster says, amused. “I suppose I certainly have.”

“And—” Dr. Yeoman crouches, her hands on her knees, and sets her tie-dyed medical kit on the floor. Sans waves at her. “—so have you, by the looks of it. How’ve you been, Mr. Sans?”

“‘m good. What about you?”

“I’ve been swell. It’s good to finally see you again—I’ve been worried. Where’s Papyrus, huh?”

Sans points underneath the couch.

“Ah—well, we’ll let him stay there a while, how about that? Let him get used to us. Who wants to go first?”

Sans points at Gaster.

“Good choice!” Dr. Yeoman motions for Gaster to come down, so he crouches reluctantly in front of her. “What seems to be the problem, doc? Er—problem _ s.  _ You’re a mess.”

“I know.” Gaster sighs. “It’s just the collar, at the moment.”

Dr. Yeoman pulls on a pair of bright pink gloves, then moves to stand beside him, resting a hand on his neck. He tries not to flinch away. She clucks her tongue unhappily, then grabs a swab kit from her bag and then drags a swab through the gouges in his bone, then another through the worn-down bone around the collar. She caps both, setting them back into her bag. “Well, it’s definitely infected—I’ll take the samples back to the lab and see what kind of bacteria we’re fighting. I can start you on some general antibiotics, but until you get that collar taken out, it’s more or less a futile fight.”

“Tell me about it.”

“So why don’t you get it removed? I can set you up with surgeon.”

“I need to, don’t I?” He shuffles his paws uncomfortably, but there’s no point waffling about it. It has to be done, no matter how much he’ll hate it. Besides, it will be a relief to have the collar gone. 

“Yes.” Dr. Yeoman pats his shoulder. “I’ll set you up with the best orthopaedic surgeon I know. She’ll have you in and out in no time at all. It should be a simple surgery, just an outpatient procedure; I bet she could even do it under local anaesthesia, if you’re uncomfortable with the general.”

Gaster brightens some. “You think?”

“Sure, kid, as long as you’d hold still. Here—” Dr. Yeoman rummages through her bag, pulling out a notepad. She scribbles down a name and number, then hands it to Gaster. “Give her a call, set up an appointment, tell her I sent you. I’ll tell her to expect you, too, so you shouldn’t have any problem getting in. In the meantime, I’ll write you that script for some general oral antibiotics. You can start taking them before the surgery, but the infection’ll clear up a lot faster once that collar is gone. After the surgery, the surgeon or I can write you a script for topical antibiotics to help it heal even faster. Sound good?”

“Yes.” Gaster thumps his tail, pleased. Local anaesthesia? He can handle local anaesthesia. As long as he’s awake and aware and free to get away if he needs to, he should be fine. “Thank you very much.”

“No problem. Now, what about these cracks?” She runs her hand along his spine, his ribs, frowning. “Those don’t look good, doc.”

“No, but there’s naught to be done about them. I used too much magic, and what I have left isn’t capable of sustaining this form in an, er, completely solid manner. If I was smaller, then maybe…” He trails off, shaking his head. “But it’s alright, really. They don’t hurt, and they all feel fairly stable. Most of them are surface-level only.”

“Even so, they’re open wounds. If you get bacteria in there, they’ll migrate to the marrow. It’s going to be terribly easy for you to get an infection.”

“I know. I’m taking care to keep them clean. Ideally, I’d like to have clothes, at some point or another.”

“Yeah, running around naked doesn’t suit you—and it certainly doesn’t keep the dirt off. You’ve already made arrangements?”

“I’m going to go speak with Thresh soon—a tailor in Hotland.”

“Good, good. The sooner you can shield those from the outside environment, the better. You’d be hard-pressed to bandage all of ‘em, huh?” She trails her hand down his haunches, his tail, counting the cracks as she goes. “Jeez. There must be a couple hundred on this side. Other side’s the same?”

“Mm-hm.”

“How’s your soul holding up?” She turns to look, then whistles, low and impressed. “Jesus, you did a number on it. The hell  _ happened?” _

He glances away.

“Right.” She pats his shoulder. “You don’t have to tell me, but—Gaster, you know what it means when a soul looks like that.”

“What’s it mean?” Sans asks, leaning forward. “I mean—I know it means his magic is weaker, and he’s sad a lot, but—why?”

“In layman’s terms, it’s soulrot,” Dr. Yeoman explains. “It happens a lot after traumatic events, like what you all experienced. It also happens to a lot of monsters after family members fall down, or after fights, or things like that. As you know, monster souls are made of love, hope, and compassion. If those things are damaged enough, then our souls begin to rot away. They can heal once those things return—sometimes they even get stronger. It happens to more monsters than you’d think; it happened to me, after my little girl died.”

Gaster winces sympathetically. 

“Oh.” Sans’ eyes soften. “I’m sorry. Are you...better now?”

“Much,” Dr. Yeoman says, smiling at him. “Of course, there are bruises left. I’ll always miss her more than anything, but I don’t despair the way I used to. It isn’t all I think about anymore. Time is the greatest doctor of us all, kiddo. She heals all wounds eventually, and there’s nothing you can do to stop her.”

“Nothing,” Sans agrees, a smile flickering across his face. “Right. So Dad’ll get better?”

“He should. For something as bad as that, though—doc, you know I’ve gotta recommend therapy.”

“Trust me, I’ve already had it recommended.”

“You should try it,” Sans says, “if it’ll help you get better.”

“Smart kid you’ve got.” Dr. Yeoman scribbles another name and number down on her notepad, then hands it to Gaster. “Best trauma therapist I know. They’ll help, Gaster. Just try a few sessions, see what you think. If they’re not a good fit, I can help you find someone else. But soulrot like that’s not gonna go away on its own. You’ll have to work for it.”

“I know.” Gaster sighs, running a claw along the paper. “I’ll...try. The boys, too. I want to get them into therapy.”

Sans’ eyes widen. “There’s nothing wrong with  _ my  _ soul.”

“That may very well be,” Gaster says, “but after what you’ve been through, little one—I want you to be able to process it. A therapist can help with that. Besides, it’ll make Papyrus feel more comfortable if you’re with him.”

“Oh.” Sans relaxes, his shoulders sagging. “Yeah, okay. If Paps is going, that’s okay.”

“Atta boy,” Dr. Yeoman says. She snatches the paper back from Gaster, scribbling something else down. “Here’s a great child psychologist. Her name’s Dr. Vanderpool. I think she’d be a good fit for Sans; Papyrus might need a more specialized therapist in the future, but this’ll be a good start. I expect he’s not old enough to talk yet?”

Gaster shakes his head. “No. We think he’s about a year old, but we’ve nothing to confirm that, yet.”

“Play therapy is going to be your best bet, then. See if Dr. Vanderpool can do something like that—or knows someone who can.”

“Will do.”

Dr. Yeoman pulls out her soul-scanner. “In the meantime, just hold still for one second—” The scanner buzzes quietly, and she sucks a breath between her teeth. “Yikes. You weren’t kidding about using too much magic.”

“What’s the damage?” Gaster asks reluctantly.

“Ten HP, five DF. Oddly enough, thirty AT.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah.”

“And LV?”

“Still one. Don’t worry, old chap.”

Gaster hums quietly. Still a one, hm? He’d better enjoy that while it lasts. “...alright. Thank you.”

“What’s that stand for?” Sans asks. “LV?”

“LOVE—level of violence,” Dr. Yeoman explains. “The lower it is, the better.”

“And Dad has a one.” Sans beams. “That’s good.”

“Yes, it is. It’s very good. Let me finish your dad’s check-up and then I’ll tell you what your LV is, okay?”

“Okay,” Sans says, although he sounds slightly less excited by that prospect. 

Dr. Yeoman looks inside Gaster’s mouth, tsking at the faint indentations on his palate, then examines the similar indentations on his shoulder and skull. “They’re healing well,” she decides at last. “I’m going to prescribe you—all three of you, more than likely—a calcium supplement for a few months, just to make sure you’re getting enough to build your bone back. Maybe it’ll help with a few of those cracks, too, Gaster. Any questions?”

Gaster shakes his head.

“Good. Sansy-boy, you’re up.” Dr. Yeoman crouches in front of him. He reaches out and tugs her sleeve, saying something in a voice too soft for Gaster to make out. Dr. Yeoman arches an eyebrow. “Well, now, that might be a good idea. Gaster, we’re gonna head up to Sans’ bedroom for this. If we’re lucky, Mr. Papyrus will follow us up, and Sans can keep him from going underneath anything. I’d rather not have to pull him out, if I don’t have to—it’d frighten him too much.”

“Oh.” Gaster heaves himself to his feet. “Well, alright. Good idea.”

“No.” Sans points at him, and he blinks. “You stay here.”

“...why?”

Sans marches forward and lowers his breath to a hiss, “Because I’m going to have to get naked and it’s  _ embarrassing.  _ Stay.”

Gaster snorts. “Little one, I’ve seen you naked more often than not. Why, when you were a baby—”

“Eeeew, stop.” Sans pushes his muzzle. “I’m not a baby anymore. Stay here.”

“Well, alright. Whatever makes you most comfortable.” Gaster curls up around the couch, setting his head on his tail and yawning. “Wake me when you’re finished.”

* * *

Sans trots up the stairs with Dr. Yeoman at his heels. As expected, Papyrus squirms out from under the couch and slinks after them, unwilling to be parted from Sans. Sans leads the way to his bedroom and then, once all three of them are inside, shuts the door and breathes a sigh of relief.

“So,” Dr. Yeoman says, taking a seat in the rocking chair. “Are you going to tell me why we’re really up here?”

Sans scuffs his sneaker against the floor. He can’t hide it from her—he supposes he could refuse to let her soul-check him, but that would be suspicious too, wouldn’t it? And she’d have to tell his dad. The only real option he has is to tell the truth and hope he can make her see reason. “It’s my soul.”

“Yes? What about it?”

“It’s—y’know. Got a few spots on it.” He waits for her to interrupt, but when he glances up, she only motions for him to continue. There’s no shock or judgement in her gaze, and he relaxes some. “I haven’t told Dad because I don’t want him to freak out, and it would just make him feel worse, right? And he can’t afford to feel worse, right now.”

“May I see?” Dr. Yeoman asks gently.

He nods and sheds his jacket, then pulls his shirt off. He turns to the side, so she can peer between his ribs. His soul isn’t as bad as Dad’s, but it’s not as shiny and white as it used to be—gray spots grow on it like mold, slowly creeping deeper and deeper. Dr. Yeoman’s face creases with sympathy. 

“Ah, little guy, that’s not good.”

“I know.” He hugs himself, leaning back against the door. “Can you give me medicine or something without telling Dad?”

Dr. Yeoman shakes her head. “I’m afraid not.”

“But—”

“But—” She holds up a hand. “You’re already headed in the right direction. You’re going to therapy; that’ll help some. But your dad needs to know, kiddo. He wants to take care of you, and he can’t do that if you’re not communicating with him.”

Sans looks guiltily at the floor. “I’m not—I’m not trying to make him upset, I just—what if it makes him worse? What if it makes his soul rot faster? What if it  _ kills  _ him? Like, literally? It’s not worth that. I can act happy. If that makes him happy, then I can—”

“Then you can get worse.” 

Sans studies his sneakers. “...how much worse?”

“That depends on you, but it isn’t worth it. These things snowball. The longer you wait, the worse it’ll be.”

“...so you’re gonna tell him.”

“No. You’re not that far gone yet, and I don’t want to force you into anything. Right now, this is up to you. If it hasn’t cleared up by the next time I see you, though, I’ll have to tell him. That’s my responsibility as your doctor. You’re a child, and you’re more mature than most, but sometimes adult still have to make the difficult decisions for you.”

Sans grimaces.

“I think it’s going to be a lot more beneficial in the long run if _you_ decide to tell him, kiddo. Your dad’s stronger than you give him credit for. Sure, it’ll hurt him to know how much _you’ve_ been hurting, but it’s not like he expects you to be okay after everything that’s happened. In fact, I think he’ll be proud of you for telling him, and I think he’ll trust you more, since you were honest. Pride and trust? They’ll help him heal.”

“You think?”

“I know. Plus, once he knows, he’ll be able to take care of you better—and that, in turn, will make him happier. It makes him  _ happy  _ to take care of you, Sans. You realize that?”

Sans hesitates, then shakes his head.

“Well, it does.”

“...he didn’t even want to have me. That’s what Jackson said. He only felt guilty, so that’s why he gave me his soul. He didn’t want Papyrus, either. He keeps getting things he doesn’t want. The least we can do is be good for him, right?” His eyes sting, and he scrubs a wrist across them. At his feet, Papyrus whines. “So we can make him less sad. If he’s gotta have us, then we should make him happy.”

“Oh, honey.” Dr. Yeoman moves to crouch in front of him, her hands on his shoulders. He sniffles and looks over her shoulder. “You  _ do  _ make him happy. That man gushes about you all day, every day; that’s what every single scientist in the lab tells me. You are his pride and joy. This problem with your soul? This is just like getting sick. Your dad doesn’t like you less for getting sick, right?”

“No, but he—he always has to take time off work, and sit around with me, and he can’t like it very much. I don’t want to bother him.”

“I promise you, you aren’t bother him. Taking time off of work? Taking care of sick kids? Loving you guys, preparing your meals, cleaning up after you? That’s what parents  _ do.” _

“But he never wanted to be a parent. He didn’t ask for any of that.”

“No, he didn’t,” Dr. Yeoman agrees. “But now that he  _ is  _ a parent? He loves it. My goodness, Sans, have you even looked at the man when he’s around you? He looks at you like you built the sun and hung the stars. You’re his universe—you and Papyrus. When he thought you were dead…”

“That’s when it started, right?” Sans whispers. “The rot? It’s because of me.”

“No,” she says firmly, squeezing his shoulders. “It is  _ not  _ because of you. You didn’t ask to be kidnapped.”

“I snuck out. I disobeyed him and I—I ruined everything because I didn’t  _ listen.” _

“Kids sneak out all the  _ time.  _ Rules were made to be broken—don’t tell your dad I said that—and they get broken every single day. You were worried about him, right? So it is his fault you snuck out? Because he worried you?”

“No!”

“Just like it’s not your fault that you were kidnapped because you snuck out. It’s Jackson’s. You never meant to hurt your dad, did you?”

Sans shakes his head quickly, tears pricking his eyes. “Never ever.”

“Then you have nothing to feel bad about. You made a mistake—it happens. Your dad’s soulrot is  _ not  _ your fault, and I swear to you, buddy, he absolutely adores taking care of you. I can’t make you tell him, and I’m not going to tell him myself yet. That’s on you. But I  _ am  _ telling you that this is something you need to do, and pretty soon. Let him help you. You want to help him, right?”

Sans nods miserably.

“That’s the same way he feels about you. He wants to help you, too. You just have to let him. You know how frustrating it is when he won’t let you help  _ him?”  _ When Sans nods again, she continues, “That’s exactly how you’re gonna make him feel if you keep this to yourself. Let him help, Sans. You deserve his help.”

Sans takes a shaky breath and wipes his eyes, his lower jaw trembling. “I’ll—maybe. I’ll think about it.”

“Atta boy.” She sets a gentle hand on the top of his skull. “I’m proud of you. Do you mind if I scan your soul really quick?”

When he consents, she runs the scanner over his sternum, then winces. “Ah. Sans. That isn’t good, sweetheart.”

“What?” His eyes widen. “What’s my LV?”

“That’s one, but so is—so is everything else. How did you use so much magic?”

Sans hugs himself again, nodding towards Papyrus. “He needed a soul. Dad couldn’t afford to give him one, not by himself, so I...helped.”

“Jesus.” She rubs her temples. “Can I scan his soul?”

“Mm-hm.” Sans kneels, gently grasping Papyrus’ shoulders to hold him still. Dr. Yeoman sweeps the scanner over his ribs. “What are his stats?”

“Well, they’re better than yours, for sure. Better than your dad’s, too. Looks like he got the good end of the deal.”

“He deserves it,” Sans says, a tad defensively. If she tries to tell him to take his magic back (not that he’s sure he even _can,_ without killing Papyrus) he’ll bite her face off. “It was worth it.”

“I didn’t even know that was possible,” Dr. Yeoman admits, jotting down their stats before tucking her scanner away. “Giving someone a soul after they’re born—lord, kid, but your dad is ridiculously smart.”

“I know.” A flicker of pride, and Sans straightens his shoulders. 

“Right, well, little genius, let’s look at the rest of you. Say ‘ah’.” 

They run through a quick check-up, and Dr. Yeoman pronounces him healthy. She only pauses once she gets to his right eyesocket, shining her penlight through it and examining the delicate bones within his skull. “Well, you’ve got a little fracture in your sphenoid, but it’s already healing. It may have been what initially blinded you, so there’s a  _ chance  _ your eyesight could come back, once it’s finished healing, but—I don’t think it’s very likely.”

“Like the cracks in Dad’s skull,” Sans says, sticking a finger into his own eyesocket to feel the fracture. “Because I used too much magic?”

“Probably—so stop using so much damned magic, got it?”

“Got it,” Sans says. “I shouldn’t be making any more souls, so I think we’re good.”

“You’d better be.”

“Can I still have a baby?”

“Hell no, you can’t. You’re five.”

He rolls his eyelights. “When I’m a grown-up.”

“Why are you thinking about that already?”

“I dunno.”

“Well—probably not, to tell you the truth. You don’t have anything to spare. Maybe if you found a couple of strong monsters, you could make one, but I wouldn’t risk it.”

“That’s okay. I don’t really want one,” Sans decides. “I’ve got Papyrus.”

“He’s your baby, is he?”

“Uh-huh. Can you look at him now?”

“Sure can. He’s not gonna bite me, is he?”

“Probably not. You’ve got two legs.”

“...right. Glad to know that’s the determining factor.” Dr. Yeoman crouches in front of Papyrus, who watches her warily. “Your turn, pup.”

* * *

Papyrus doesn’t like strangers. In fact, he only just found out that strangers were a thing that existed—up until two months ago, the only person in his life was Master. Sans and Dad and Soft Master were strangers, for a time, but they aren’t anymore, and so Papyrus likes them. The strangers from the park were alright; they didn’t hurt Sans or Papyrus or Dad, but perhaps that’s only because the three of them were behaving the way they were supposed to. Those strangers hadn’t tried to touch any of Papyrus’ family, but  _ this  _ stranger, with her sleek brown fur and flat tail and pink sweater, is putting her hands all over them.

Papyrus doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like her.

She made Sans cry.

So when she kneels in front of him and meets his eyes, he bristles his spines and clicks his claws briskly against the floor in warning.  _ Tap, tap. _

“Hey, buddy.” Sans sits next to him, pulling Papyrus into his lap. He smooths a hand over Papyrus’ spines, and Papyrus allows them to be pushed flat again. “It’s okay. She’s not gonna hurt you.”

“Of course not—who could hurt such a cute little guy?” the stranger coos; her voice is happy and upbeat. It makes Papyrus’ tail want to wag, but he fights the urge. He will not be placated so easily by someone who made his big brother  _ cry.  _ “I’m just gonna look you over and make sure you’re nice and healthy, alright? How’s that sound? Sans, can you get him to stand a little bit away from you? I just wanna get a look at his bones, make sure there aren’t any cracks.”

Sans scoops Papyrus up and sets him on his feet. He lets himself be manipulated, unwilling to struggle against Sans’ hands, although he side-eyes the stranger unhappily. She rakes her eyes over one side, then shuffles over to crouch next to Sans so she can see his other side. “Good job, Paps,” Sans murmurs, scratching beneath his chin. Papyrus huffs.

“He looks pretty good, doesn’t he?” the stranger asks. “No cracks that I can see. There’s that little scar down his spine, but that’s been there a while. Does his back still bother him very much?”

“Sometimes,” Sans admits. “He still has trouble turning fast, or getting up after he’s been laying down. Dad says it’s got something to do with the concentrator.”

“I assume that’s the box on his neck?”

“Mm-hm. Dad says he’ll have to have surgery to get it removed.”

“Looks like your dad was right. Will he mind if I touch him?”

“Uuh—probably. Here.” Sans scoops Papyrus back up, settling him against his chest. He braces one hand on the back of Papyrus’ skull, preventing him from squirming away when the stranger’s hands touch his back. He whines unhappily, and Sans hushes him. “Shh, Paps, I promise you’re okay. Just hold still a second.”

Furry fingers fuss with the box on Papyrus’ neck. They tug at it, and he feels the pressure through the whole of his spine as it shifts the wires. He shudders, digging his claws into Sans’ shoulders. 

“I think that might hurt him,” Sans says, and the fingers on the box immediately move back. He sighs with relief. 

“It must.”

“Can you fix it? Make it hurt less, at least?”

“I can recommend him to a surgeon. They’ll be able to get the box and the wires off—hopefully without breaking anything else. After that, we can start him on a tiny dose of painkillers, but he’s so young—” The stranger sighs softly. “Damn. Damn, damn, damn. After that, physical therapy’s gonna be his best bet. Have you been practicing the therapy I taught you with him?”

“Yeah, every day. It’s helped a little, but with his back the way it is…”

“No, no, I understand. Can you go to the other side of the room? Have him follow you. I want to see how he moves.”

Sans sets Papyrus down, then moves to the rocking chair and crouches, patting his knees. “C’mere, Pappy.”

Papyrus scowls at him. Then the stranger takes a step in Sans’ direction, and Papyrus skitters across the room, eager to place himself between the stranger and his brother. His spines begin to lift again, but Sans pats them back down. 

“Hard to tell from just that, and I’m no physical therapist,” the stranger hedges, “but he still moves more stiffly than most puppies I’ve seen. And what’s that mark, there?” She gestures to the base of Papyrus’ tail, where the bone has been chewed into shallow dents. 

“We don’t know.” Sans frowns, and Papyrus nudges up against his face until he smiles again. “He’s had it since I met him.”

“Hmm.” The stranger scratches her chin. “Can you hold his face still for me? I want to look at his muzzle.”

Sans’ hands cup his face, fingers curling lightly around his muzzle to keep it shut. He begins to pant anxiously. Sans rarely confines him. It reminds him of being muzzled, of being strapped down and held in place while agony blazed through his bones. He doesn’t fight, though. He knows better than that. 

The stranger gets far, far too close to his face, and he tucks his tail between his legs. Her fingers brush his nose, and he trembles, remembers the burning, remembers the—

* * *

Hard, gloved fingers grasp his jaw, clamp tightly around his muzzle. “I told you,” Jackson says, tired and disappointed, “to stop chewing your tail. It’s not going to make you feel any better. Why the hell don’t you just  _ listen?”  _ He sighs, reaches into a small beaker that stinks of sour acid. 134 cries out in little terrified puppy noises that make Jackson scowl. The fingers on his muzzle squeeze more tightly. 

“Well,” he says, dipping the fingers of his free hand into the beaker and smearing the acid across 134’s nose. “That’s what I get for creating something so stupid.”

134 burns. He scrapes his paws over his nose, crying out desperately, his eyes welling with tears. The burning spreads to his paws, his wrists, and he shrieks and slings his head from side to side. Nothing helps. Nothing ever helps. 

“Stop chewing,” Jackson reminds him, “and we won’t have to do this.”

* * *

“It looks thinner there, doesn’t it?” she asks quietly. Her gloves stick to his muzzle, searingly familiar. His sides heave. He feels sick. “The bone at the edge of his nasals. Pockmarked, too.”

She sits back again, and Sans releases him. “Paps?” he says quietly. “Are you okay?”

Papyrus slinks beneath the bed and cowers in the corner. He smells sour acid. His nose burns, and he scrapes his paws over it over and over and over. His wrists sting.

“I think that’s all you’re gonna be able to do today,” Sans says softly.

“That’s alright. There’s no point in stressing him out more than we need to—if nothing else, the surgeon can give him a proper examination when he’s sedated.” She kneels, peers under the bed, and he shies away from her eyes. He doesn’t want to be looked at. He doesn’t want to be seen, or heard, or touched. He doesn’t want to exist. “Poor thing. I don’t suppose he has any medication to help him calm down?”

“No. Can you give him anything?”

“I’d rather not. That’s a psychologist's forte, I’m afraid. I’ll make a recommendation, though. No kid should have to go through this sort of fear.”

“No,” Sans agrees grimly. “They shouldn’t. Hey, I’m—I don’t wanna rush you, but I think he really just needs some time to calm down.”

“Quite alright.” The stranger straightens up, grabbing her bag. “I’ll just go speak with your father for a moment, and then I’ll be off. It was nice to see you again, Sans. Take care of yourself, alright? And don’t be afraid to let your family take care of you, too.”

“Right. Bye, Dr. Yeoman. See you later.”

The stranger steps out of the room, clicks the door shut behind her. Sans kneels next to the bed, peeking underneath it, and Papyrus tries valiantly to cram himself through the wall, breathing hard. His brother’s eyes soften, and he stands up again, tugging the blanket off of the bed. He wedges it underneath, instead, tossing it across Papyrus’ body and eyes. It’s dark. Warm. It smells like Sans, not like acid, or feathers, or nasty nitrile gloves. He relaxes minutely.

After a second, he hears Sans move away again. He hears the click of blocks, and Sans begins to hum a soft, familiar lullaby. Sans waits. He doesn’t drag Papyrus out, or force him to interact and focus and obey. He just...waits. Patient. As though he could wait endlessly for this one thing. Papyrus buries his muzzle into the blanket and breathes until he stops feeling the burn of acid on his snout, until he stops seeing flickers of Master’s face and feathers and blue gloves.

...it take a long, long time.

Soon, he hears the thump of Dad’s pawsteps outside. He has a murmured conversation with Sans, then retreats again. Minutes pass. Papyrus peeks out—Sans is building a Lego fort. He’s sprawled on his belly, face propped in one hand and legs kicking over his back. Papyrus clicks his teeth.  _ Click, click, click.  _ He likes this. He likes being small and safe and hidden, watching the world pass by him from the safety of his cocoon. His brother won’t hurt him. Sans won’t hurt him. He’s almost sure of that, now.

….almost.

He smells pasta cooking downstairs. He hesitates, then dares to thump his tail on the ground. Sans glances in his direction, smiles.

Master never smiled at him.

“Hey, buddy.” Sans’ voice is soft, calm. “Wanna come play?”

Papyrus creeps out from underneath the bed, dragging the blanket along with him so he can huddle underneath it. Sans reaches out, gives him time to move away—when he doesn’t, Sans ties the blanket around Papyrus’ neck like a cape.

“There,” he says, pride in his voice. “You’re my little hero, Paps. Don’t ever forget it.”

Papyrus never will.

“Look.” Sans shows him a block, and Papyrus obligingly sniffs it. It smells like plastic, and like Sans’ hands. “You can build really cool things with these. It’s easier if you have hands—you could have hands, I bet, if you wanted to.” He takes Papyrus’ paw, presses it to his palm. Even as small as Papyrus still is, his talons dwarf Sans’ stubby fingers. “You’re like us. I bet you can change, too.”

Papyrus doesn’t understand what that means. He certainly doesn’t understand how to do it—but that night, he dreams. He dreams of being small and compact. He dreams of standing on two legs, like his masters before him, of being strong and brave and commanding. He dreams of a cape, tied around his neck and flapping in the wind.

He dreams of being a hero.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: nystagmus effect is an!! actual thing!! grab a friend and spin them around really fast, then look at their irises! they should bounce back and forth :D sometimes they do it after rollercoasters, too. it’s just your body tryin to regain balance, so its pretty normal! it is also Definitely a metaphor in this chapter u.u


	24. testimony (you are loved)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: body horror, discussions of trauma/violence/abuse/unethical experimentation/death, vomiting, separation anxiety
> 
> we have!!! more art aaaAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!! 
> 
> first we have [a really pretty jackson design](https://mirkrali.tumblr.com/post/190976254404/algernon-chapter-1-parsnipit-undertale%22) by @mirkrali on tumblr!!! ;alkgj he'S SO PRETTY?? I HATE HIM BUT GOOD G O D. 
> 
> then we have [this](https://ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber.tumblr.com/post/611213289216704512/snip-broke-my-soul%22) lovely sketch page by @ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber !!! there are!! lovely asgores (one ft. anger), some jacksons (some of which are being lovingly murdered), and a sans !!!!!
> 
> thank you both again as;lgkj you're amazing!!!!!!!

“I will be back in  _ one  _ hour, and not a second longer,” Gaster says, holding up a single talon. Sans scowls at him. “I promise.”

“I don’t like it.” Sans folds his arms over his chest. Papyrus glances up at his face, studying his big brother for a moment before turning and huffing his apparent dissatisfaction in Gaster’s direction.

“I know, and to be quite honest, neither do I—but I’m a little sick of walking around naked, to tell you the truth, and I need to look professional for the Judge. Alphys will take good care of you both. Besides, this is a good opportunity to introduce Papyrus to a new environment.”

“Another  _ lab?” _

“You know as well as I do that Alphys’ lab is the least labby lab Underground,” Gaster points out. “She’s already cleaned up everything that could  _ possibly  _ be dangerous or upsetting. The most you have to fear is getting sucked into another anime.”

“A reasonable fear,” Sans admits. “I think we’re planning to watch  _ Sailor Moon.” _

“See? That’ll be fun. You need to have fun.”

“Hrm.” Sans’ mouth twists unhappily. “I want to go with you.”

“No, sweetheart. Not this time.”

“Why not?”

There isn’t a  _ solid  _ reason that Sans can’t come with him—he’s only going to Thresh’s, after all. It would be perfectly safe for the two of them, even if it would make Papyrus uncomfortable. The truth is, Gaster wants to see if he  _ can  _ leave them alone. He hasn’t been separated from them for more than half an hour since they returned from Toriel’s, and he knows perfectly well that isn’t healthy for any of them.

Moreover, he has a more... _demanding_ visit later this afternoon that he really won’t be able to bring his children with him for. His visit to Thresh’s will be a good warm-up for them all. Although hates to push his children so much in one day, Asgore has been rather getting rather impatient—and that’s fair enough, Gaster supposes. They _had_ put the Judgement on hold for an entire month while Gaster had been fucking around in the Ruins because he was too afraid to come back and face the aftermath.

He really can’t avoid it any longer.

“Because,” he says to Sans, as gently as he can, “we need to be able to function apart from each other. It isn’t healthy for us to stay with each other all the time. I know you’re worried, and I am, too—but I  _ am  _ going to come back, and I believe you’re going to be safe and sound when I do. If you get frightened, you can text me, and I’ll answer as soon as I’m able.”

Sans looks uncertainly at him. “...pinky promise?”

Gaster holds out his littlest talon, and Sans hooks his pinky over it as best he can. God, his hands are tiny. “Pinky promise, little one. I’ll not leave you again.”

So, albeit reluctantly, Gaster leaves his children with Alphys after breakfast. Papyrus isn’t happy about the change in scenery—but he does quickly find a new hiding place beneath the desk, and he watches the world warily from the shadows. Gaster warbles a quiet goodbye to him, then nuzzles Sans one last time. He shares a brief conversation with Alphys, making sure he declares his intent to be back within the hour once again, quite loudly and quite within Sans’ earshot, before heading for Thresh’s. The minute he ducks through the doors of the tailor’s shop, Thresh rounds the corner and stares at him. 

“You,” they say quietly.

“Me,” Gaster agrees, rubbing his paws sheepishly together. He hunches in the lobby, his tail curled around his feet. He is... _ very  _ aware of his mangled form, suddenly. “I am so sorry.”

_ “You.”  _ A real accusation, this time. “You think you come in here, looking like this, make me make even  _ more  _ clothes—I make you enough clothes for an  _ army,  _ my god, doc. Your family! Your family is the reason there’s a fabric shortage in the Underground, you know that? Ridiculous.” They stomp into their back room again. “Just ridiculous.”

“I can—try somewhere else, I mean—” He starts to rise.

“Sit your giant butt back down,” they snap. He sits his giant butt back down. “I cloth you. I always do, don’t I?” They stomp back out with their measuring tape and begin taking his dimensions. “Stupidly big, you. This how big your boy is gonna get?”

“Boys,” Gaster corrects, already wincing.

_ “Boys?!  _ You mean to tell me there is  _ another?” _

“Erm—yes?”

Thresh makes a sound akin to choked scream, burying their face against their palms and lashing their tail. “You! Stop having babies! Your genes are a blight on this occupation,” they say, jabbing a finger at Gaster’s chest.

Gaster cringes. “Sorry, sorry. I really don’t mean to have them.”

“How you not  _ mean  _ to have a baby? Isn’t a thing you can do by mistake, mister.” They scurry to their back room to grab their clipboard and pencil, then return, glowering at him. “Takes intent to form a soul.”

“It’s a...long story,” Gaster admits. He must sound more miserable than he means to, because Thresh’s eyes soften.

“Hey.” They reach up, patting his forearm a tad awkwardly. “Is okay, big fella. I know I give you hard time, but I really don’t mind. You keep me in business. And anyway, is fun, designing clothes for you two. Er, three. You want something for the new kid?”

“Not yet. Most of Sans’ baby clothes fit him well enough, and they’re still in good shape.”

“Hand-me-downs, eh? No substitute for personality. He needs somethin’ his own.”

“Yes. Something…” Gaster cocks his head. “A coat, perhaps? And a scarf.”

“Colors?”

Gaster thinks about it as Thresh sketches, lounging in their armchair. Papyrus isn’t a monochrome child; he’s full of personality. What does Gaster want to inspire in him? What does he need now? “Orange,” he decides finally. “Orange and green.”

“Ew, together?”

“Well—well, maybe not together—”

“I give you orange jacket, red stripes, red gloves, red hat. Also a green coat, red sleeves; Gyftmas colors, how about that?”

“Yes—yes, that sounds wonderful. Thank you.”

“No problem. And what colors for you, milquetoast?”

“Purples and blacks. Business casual, if you would. And maybe a—a white turtleneck?”

“Yeah, I thought you’d be missing your turtleneck. Hide that collar, too.” Thresh frowns at his collar. Gaster hasn’t scheduled his surgery to have it removed quite yet—he wants it as evidence, first. He wants to show the Judge  _ exactly  _ what was done to him. It is shame and steel, wrapped tightly through his bones. “Who did that to you?” They squint. “I kill them.”

Gaster laughs nervously. “Oh, no, no, that’s hardly necessary—”

“I kill them _very dead_ for you, milquetoast.”

“That’s—um. Very generous, but I assure you I’m alright—”

“I make you a coat of their flesh.”

“Oh my god.” He pauses, then focuses one large eye on Thresh. “...you think I could pull off a feather boa?”

One tailoring session later and Gaster is out of the door. Thresh had generously decided to make his a priority order, since he’ll be standing before the Judge so soon, and they expect to have the first pieces done within the week. Gaster practically lopes to Alphys’ house, bursting through the doors and looking eagerly for his babies.

“Boys?”

“Dad!” Sans sticks his head over the railing, relief evident in his eyes. “You were gone too long.”

“I was not. I was well within the one-hour limit.”

“Too long,” Sans says accusingly.

“Yes,” Gaster agrees, stretching up to touch his muzzle to Sans’ face. “It felt like it. How are you? Where’s your brother?”

“He’s okay—he’s safe, hiding under there.” Sans points back at Alphys’ bed. Alphys waves at him; they’d been in the middle of their Sailor Moon binge, evidently. She’s wearing a sweater with the characters on the front, and Sans has matching socks on. “And I’m okay too. What about you? How was everything?”

“It went well. Thresh will have the first few clothes done soon; I requested the formalwear first, so when I appear before the Judge, I can at least make a semi-decent impression,” Gaster says, wry. “That’s one step in the right direction.”

They eat lunch together—ramen noodles and Capri Suns—and Gaster even manages to squeeze in an episode of Sailor Moon. He purrs raspily as he does, resting his head next to the bed and trying to soothe Papyrus with the noise. Papyrus relaxes in increments, although he still looks uncertain about this new place with all of its attendant new smells and sights and sounds. Gaster wishes he could stay and help his child acclimate, but—

But it’s time.

He pushes himself to his feet, taking a deep breath.

“Are you going to help with the evidence now?” Sans asks, frowning.

“I did tell Asgore I would.”

“Ugh.”

“I know, I know—but it has to be done if we want to bring Jackson to justice.”

“Why can’t the Guard get all of the evidence themselves? That’s their job.”

“Because—and you know I love Guard, so I say this with all due respect—they have no idea what they’re looking for. The cages, the test tubes, the surgery equipment, they’ve packed that all, of course, but the papers require a keener eye. Besides, I want to see Papyrus’ file before it’s locked away. I want to know how old he is, his birthday, his—”

“The experiments Jackson did on him.”

“Well, it is important to know. It could help us manage his triggers more efficiently.”

“I don’t want you to go back.”

“And I don’t particularly want to go back, but it will be perfectly safe. Half the Guard is working the case. We’ve tarried long enough; it’s been over a month already. The longer we wait, the more impatient the Judge grows. If we want her to make a fully-informed decision, then we need to get this information to her as expediently as we can.”

“Can’t I come?”

“To Jackson’s lab?”

“Yeah.”

“Um, absolutely no you cannot.”

“Why not? You said it would be safe. Half the Guard is there, remember? If it’s safe enough for you, it’s safe enough for me.”

“I don’t want you re-engaging with such traumatic memories.”

“Oh, but you get to?”

“I’m an adult. I have a few more coping mechanisms than you do.”

“It’s not fair.” Sans crosses his arms, glaring. “I wanna go.”

“And what? Leave Papyrus all alone here, or take him with us, back to the place he was tortured for so long?”

Sans flinches. “No, I—”

“Because you know good and well that he’s going freak out the moment you leave this room without him.”

“I know.” Sans scowls.

“Then it’s settled. You and Papyrus will stay here, and—”

“No!”

“Sans.” He sighs softly. “What other option would you propose?”

“I can—we can take Papyrus, but he doesn’t have to go near the house. Grillby’s there, right? And he’s okay with Grillby. He’d probably let Grillby watch him.”

“No. Grillby has a job to do, just like everyone else there. They’re not our personal babysitters, little one, and you can’t expect it of them.” Although, Gaster is pained to admit, he’s sure he’s going to be asking all of his friends to watch his children more often than he rightly should these next few months—he simply can’t bring himself to trust a stranger watching them while he goes about his business.

Sans growls in frustration. “I  _ don’t  _ want you to  _ go.” _

“I must. Sometimes you have to do things in life that you won’t necessarily want to—”

Sans flings his hands in the air. “Fine! Fine, do whatever you want. See if I care what happens. I’ll just stay here and  _ wait.  _ Got pretty good at that, back at Jackson’s, and after you  _ left _ , so what’s new now?”

Gaster flinches. For a moment, guilt flashes across Sans’ face—and then his eyes harden, and he stomps back towards the bed to wedge himself under it, alongside Papyrus. Papyrus whines in concern, nudging his brother’s face. Alphys stares at him. 

Gaster remembers, suddenly, that Sans is five.

...this is too much for one day. Gaster has already pushed them enough, leaving Sans for even an hour. They should be celebrating that victory instead of clawing for another one. For a moment, Gaster wants nothing more than to call Asgore and cancel—tell him they’ll do it some other time, when Sans isn’t already stressed from being left. Another larger (angrier,  _ colder)  _ part of him  _ needs  _ this evidence, and he needs it now.

The sooner Jackson is judged, the better.

“I’ll, um—I-I can give you two a moment?” Alphys offers.

“Yes, please,” Gaster murmurs. Alphys scurries down the stairs, and Gaster sighs and curls up next to the bed. He sets his head down beside it. Two sets of glowing white eyelights peer back at him. 

“Go away,” Sans says scathingly. “Go back to Jackson’s already.”

“You’ve a barbed tongue, little one.”

“I don’t care.”

“Yes you do.”

“No I  _ don’t.” _

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Sans snaps. “Leave us alone.”

Gaster falls quiet, studying his son carefully. “Little one—”

“It’s like you don’t care! You’re not even thinking about how I feel, how Papyrus feels! What are we supposed to think? You’re going back to the place that stupid guy  _ tortured  _ you, and we’re just supposed to lay around here and  _ wait?  _ It’s not fair and you know it.”

“No,” Gaster admits. “It’s not. None of this is fair, but it has to be done. We have to make sure Jackson is judged appropriately—you deserve justice, Papyrus deserves justice, all of your siblings deserve justice, and I’m going to make sure they get it.”

Frustrated tears gleam along Sans’ eyesockets, and he turns his back on Gaster. Gaster croons sadly, inching closer to the bed. His son begins to sniffle, his little bones shaking, and Papyrus whines urgently and nudges his arm.

“You know I care how you feel,” Gaster murmurs. “I don’t want you to be scared or unhappy.”

“Then don’t—” Sans’ breath hitches, his voice cracking. “Don’t go back there.”

“Oh, baby boy.” Gaster curls a paw underneath the bed, gently pulling Sans out from underneath it—and Sans doesn’t struggle. Once he’s out from under the bed, he turns around and hugs Gaster’s arm tightly. “I must. For justice, for—”

“You could have just killed him, if that’s all you wanted,” Sans chokes, and Gaster’s soul chills. “You should have just killed him when you had the chance.”

Gaster hushes him, wrapping a paw around his back and pulling him into a hug as best he can. “No,” he murmurs. “No, no, little one. That’s not true. Killing is a—it’s a last resort, always. It’s not right to do so, not unless it’s in self defense or until a Judgement has been made.”

(Of course Gaster has already made his judgement, but his child need not know that.)

“Besides,” he continues, “Jackson can’t do any more harm, now. He’s locked up and he can’t get out. He won’t be at his house; everything is safe now.”

“It doesn’t feel like that. It doesn’t feel safe anymore, especially not  _ there.” _

“I know it doesn’t. That’s what happens when you experience something as awful as what you did—things stop feeling safe, but I promise they  _ are,  _ and you’ll feel that way again. No, I don’t feel well, going back to Jackson’s house, but for what he did to you, to all your little siblings—I would return a thousand times over. You understand, don’t you, little one?”

Sans nods miserably, still clinging to him.

“But your brother needs you here so  _ he  _ can feel safe. Can you do that for me, Sans? Can you stay here and take care of him? You’re very good at that.”

“Yeah. I guess,” Sans mumbles, although he doesn’t sound the least bit happy about it. “Text me to tell me you’re alright while you’re there. Don’t be gone long.”

“I’ll be in and out as fast I can. Even if I haven’t finished with the paperwork, I’ll be here in time for dinner.”

Sans sighs and releases him, wiping his eyes. Gaster leans forward and nudges his face affectionately, and he receives a weary pat on the nose for his troubles. “Hurry up,” Sans says.

Gaster nods, hopping from the second floor to the first in one brisk leap. He looks back, wagging his tail for whatever comfort that can bring. “I love you, little ones.”

Sans dredges up a tired smile. “We love you too, pops. Stay safe.”

And with that, Gaster leaves his sons again. It feels like terror, like jumping into the void, and his bones rattle with it—but he plunges through his fear and across Hotland, his breathing coming in cold gasps. He wants to go back to Alphys’ lab. He wants nothing more than to return and never leave his children again, never ever ever. 

Impossible, that dream. A parent’s fate is to leave their children, in the end. It always is.

He skids to a stop outside of Jackson’s house. The Guard mills around—they aren’t gathering evidence, as that’s already been done, so he knows their presence is merely a security measure. Asgore waves at him from down the street, and he chuffs and wags his tail, padding forward. The Guard parts for him with cheerful shouts of greeting and gentle harping on his tardiness. 

“Hey, there, Wingdings,” Asgore says, patting Gaster’s snout when he lowers his head. “I thought you’d stood me up, there for a minute.”

“Nonsense. I just had to assure the children I’d be alright. I convinced Sans, but only barely—if possible, I’d like to get this over with within the next few hours.”

“That’s up to you, old boy. I can’t comprehend any of those files, but I’m sure it will be like reading picture books to you. We’ve moved most all of them down the street, to the evidence locker, but there are a few rigged with puzzles. We didn’t want to set any of them off and destroy evidence; you’re our best bet to getting them open.”

“Oh, fantastic,” Gaster murmurs half-heartedly. “Let’s get started with the puzzles.”

“Yes, that’s what I thought. Get the bad stuff over with first.”

“All of it’s bad.”  
“Get the worst stuff over with first.”

“That’s more like it.” Gaster pads towards the house. It’s different, now that it’s empty. It hardly smells like Jackson at all; the scent of the Guard smothers everything else. He sees a flicker of flame inside, and he lets out a breath of relief as he crams himself through the doorway. “Grillby. How’d I know we’d find you in a kitchen?”

_ It’s my calling,  _ Grillby signs, flickering yellow with amusement. He reaches out to rest a hand on Gaster’s elbow.  _ I’m here for you, Wings. There’s no shame if you need to step outside and take a breather. _

“Thank you,” Gaster says, “but I’d like to get it over with all at once.”

_ Then I’ll be with you the whole time, if that’s alright. _

“I’ve no complaints to make.” 

Together, the three of them head down the stairs and into the basement. Gaster feels...surprisingly numb. Everything is so different, now. The smashed incubators have been removed, the solution mopped up, the...dead infants cleared away….

His dead infants.

He swallows hard.

“The first puzzle is here.” Asgore stops in front of a large, locked file cabinet. “I trust you can figure it out.”

“Well,” Gaster says grimly, “I am the Royal Scientist for something, aren’t I?”

He takes a seat in front of the file cabinet, thinking carefully through the puzzle. His paws aren’t much for moving the small blocks of this particular jigsaw, so Grillby does it for him. It’s not a simple puzzle, but it’s not the hardest he’s seen, either. Surprisingly average work, from such an awful monster as Jackson was. After several moments, the cabinet clicks open.

“There,” he says quietly. “All done.”

“Fantastic! Well done, Wingdings. I knew I could count on you. Ipera, Mesh, would you please get a few photos and then take the papers up to the evidence locker? Dr. Gaster will be along to read them shortly.”

As Ipera and Mesh step forward to obey, Asgore leads Gaster farther into the basement, into the room of small cages, except—well, all of the cages are gone, now. He remembers what his babies looked like, locked up there, sick and injured and miserable. The memory is hazy. Distant. He takes another slow step after Asgore, sits down in front of another file cabinet. He solves the puzzle easily, and the papers are whisked away after photos are taken.

The third and final puzzle is in the room where he...changed. The shattered glass has been swept away, the solution scrubbed off the concrete floors. The computers have been left. The alarm is still ripped off of the wall. His spines begin to lift, but he forces them back down and sucks in another deep breath. He’s fine. He’s safe. 

(He doesn’t believe it, not at all.)

He remembers what it felt like. The agony. The fear. The grief. The sense that he was finally, completely, entirely all alone in the world. It was a very small feeling.

His head droops as he works on the next puzzle. He doesn’t feel very well. His paws shake, however subtly. Grillby smooths a hand down his spine, crackling as soothingly at he can. Gaster remembers Toriel’s fireplace, lounging on a quilt with his sons, and he feels a little bit better. He solves the puzzle, steps back to let the Guard work, and then slinks back upstairs. He remembers the dust that covered the floor, here. His children’s dust.

He staggers outside of the house, steps over the crime scene tape, and retches enthusiastically into the dirt. Dry red dust clings to his bones. He loathes the feeling of it. It makes his soul crawl.

“Oh—Wingdings, dear,” Asgore pats one shoulder while he vomits, and Grillby pats the other. Pat, pat, pat, pat. He can’t stand the touch. It’s too much. Everything is too much. He leans away, and they let him go. “Are you alright? Should I fetch a doctor?”

“‘m fine,” Gaster mumbles, shaking rot off of his muzzle. It isn’t quite as black as it was—charcoal gray, now, with flakes of silver. He wishes he could feel happy about that. His head hangs low, and he sways on his paws. He wants off of the dust. He wants  _ off of the fucking dust.  _ He bunches his haunches, the springs up in one big push, landing neatly on top of Jackson’s house. The shingles are sizzlingly hot, but they’re better than the dust.

Anything is better than that goddamned dust.

“Ah—Wingdings?” Asgore cups his hand over his eyes. “I’m not sure that’s the best place for you to—”

Grillby sets a hand on his shoulder.  _ Let him go. Let him rest a moment. _

Asgore takes a deep breath, then inclines his head. “We’ll be down at the evidence locker, little one,” he calls up. “Meet us there when you’re ready. I’ll leave an entourage with you, so you needn’t feel unsafe.”

The bulk of the crowd gravitates down the street, towards the impromptu evidence locker that’s been set up nearby. An entourage of guards stays near the house, talking quietly amongst themselves. Gaster sits, curls his tail around his paws, and shakes the dust off of his claws. He needs to follow Asgore soon. The quicker he get through those cursed papers, the quicker he can get back to his babies. (The only babies that survived Jackson’s atrocities.)

But he can’t stand that dust right now.

After several minutes, he stands and gathers himself, crouches low, and then springs to the roof of the next house on the street. Fortunately for him, they’re spaced closely together (so close together—how could no one have noticed that children were being  _ tortured  _ just a few houses down?). He keeps his bounding steps light and quick, so he doesn’t damage the roofs. The moment he lands on one rooftop, he’s preparing for the next jump. He’s enormous, but he’s all bone, and he takes care not to scrape any shingles off as he springs from house to house.

He makes it down the street and to the evidence locker in only a handful of minutes, then climbs down the side of one house and onto the ground. He lunges into the locker, shuddering violently at the dust under his paws (however brief the contact was), and blinks unhappily at Asgore and Grillby.

“Well,” Asgore says. “You certainly got here quick.”

“Yes. I want to get this over with as quickly as I can.”

“Let’s get started, then.”

Asgore leads him to the cabinets and cabinets of papers, and Gaster sighs and sits and gets to work. Most of the papers are standard—dilution series, experiments with plasmid DNA, tests on the solubility and concentrations of DT/M. Lists of supplies, simple observatory notes, some of which date back to mere months after the official Project Blaster was cancelled. He stumbles across a file of data charts for each experiment, and he rifles through them until he finds GBP134. 

Papyrus’ birthday, as it turns out, is on August 12th. It’s been barely two years since his creation—two years, full of nothing but trauma and fear and pain. Where regular monsters are concerned, he’s only a little over a year old. A baby. He’s just a goddamned  _ baby.  _ Gaster takes a deep breath and sets that file aside. He can’t read it. Not yet. 

He’ll save the worst for last.

As he reads, he speaks quickly to one of the Guard’s scribes, who jots his words down—he does his best to explain what the documents mean and what Jackson was doing without inserting his own opinions, as much as he wants to. That can wait for his actual statement. Right now, he isn’t speaking as Wingdings Gaster. Right now, he’s speaking as the kingdom’s Royal Scientist.

The thought leaves a sour taste in his mouth.

Once he’s finished combing through the simplest of the papers, he steels himself and turns to the difficult ones—the ones that describe cruel experiments and horrific living conditions, dressed up in pretty platitudes and unyielding science. His claws dig into the table, his tail flicking angrily; he does his best to keep it from outright lashing. He reads about beatings and abuse, about starvation and vicious operations, about vivisections and dissections and terrible, terrible conditioning.

He reads, and he restates everything as simply as he can for the scribe, and he  _ hates. _

By the time he staggers back out of the evidence locker, he’s fuming. He keeps his head low, lashes his tail furiously as soon as it has room to, and he snarls. Asgore rushes out after him. “Wingdings, please, settle down—I know it’s awful, but you musn’t—”

Grillby steps in front of Gaster.  _ It’s alright,  _ he says, signing calmly.

“It is the farthest thing in the world from  _ alright,”  _ Gaster hisses. A violent jolt of pain goes through his shoulders, and he tears his claws through the ground.

“Wingdings?” 

A hand rests on his leg, and he flinches and whirls around, snapping his teeth inches from Asgore’s horns. Asgore flinches back, lifting his hands to defend himself, and horror seethes in Gaster’s chest. What the fuck?  _ What the fuck?  _ Asgore would never hurt him, and he certainly doesn’t deserve to be snapped at.

Gods, Gaster can’t let his emotions control him like this.

_ Your Majesty, please,  _ Grillby signs.  _ He needs space. _

“You don’t have to tell me twice.” Asgore backs away, his hands held up. There’s a sort of wariness in his eyes that makes Gaster’s soul ache. He’d never hurt Asgore, never! 

...that doesn’t stop the anger, though.

His chest burns. He digs his claws into the dust, braces himself, gives his bones a good warning rattle. The Guard backs away, murmuring uncertainly amongst themselves. Their voices grate against the inside of his skull. His breath comes in choppy gasps, and he doesn’t know why this is happening, why does he feel this way, why can’t he  _ stop feeling this way,  _ he shouldn’t be feeling this way, not here, not yet, not around these people—

He struggles for a deep breath. In. Out. In—

His vision hazes red, and he staggers as another spasm of pain courses through his shoulders and down his spine.

Grillby moves to stand in front of him again.  _ Gaster,  _ he says, signing slowly and clearly.  _ It’s okay. You’re upset, and you have every right to be.  _

Upset? Oh, this is far past the point of  _ upset.  _ This is boiling, festering fury, this is rage, this is  _ hate— _ the same hate Jackson shoved into his soul all those weeks ago. For a moment, he wants nothing more than to bolt to the palace, find Jackson, and tear his entrails out. But—

But he knows better than that. He’s angry, not stupid. If he hurts Jackson now, Asgore will have no choice but to hand Gaster over to the Judge, too. He doesn’t want to put his king—his  _ friend— _ into that position, nor does he want to be punished for any crime. He can’t be imprisoned, not now, not with the children to look after.

If he’s going to kill Jackson, he’s going to do it one of two ways: secretively or legally.

In the meantime, he cannot allow himself to feel this way. He cannot allow himself to frighten others. He must be good. He must be calm, he must be peaceful, he must be rational. He must not be the beast Jackson has made him. He sucks in a deep breath, and he’s relieved when he exhales a miserable whine instead of a growl.

_ I know you’re frightened and confused,  _ Grillby says,  _ but I promise it’s going to be alright. Let us help, let us— _

“No. No, I think,” he croaks, and what a relief it is that the words come out calmly, “I’m going to go home now.”

_ Ah.  _ Grillby actually looks disappointed.  _ You’re going to be stubborn. _

“By all means,” Asgore says, “go and rest. You’ve had a very trying day.”

Grillby lifts his hands to speak again, but before he can, Gaster turns his back and bolts. He runs from the dust of Hotland, from the numbness of Jackson’s lab and the rage that twists in his soul when he thinks on slaughtered children and terrible science. He bursts into Alphys’ lab panting and trembling, and Sans is on him in an instant.

“Dad! What’s wrong? What happened? Are you hurt?” Tiny skeletal hands run over his legs, his paws, feeling frantically for a new wound. 

“I’m okay,” he rasps. “Just—tired, is all. I wanted to get back to you.”

That’s all he ever wants, he thinks. He just wants to be with his sons. He just wants them to be safe and happy and okay. He wants them to have what they need. If he could only get that for them, everything would be alright again—and he is  _ going  _ to make everything alright again. Only a little longer, now.

* * *

A few days after his visit to Jackson’s lab, Gaster goes to give his statement. Sans will be giving his statement from home—Gaster had been strict about that. There’s no reason for him to stand before the Judge; it would be far too intimidating for him. Somehow, Sans weaseles his way into being allowed to come to the palace anyway. Gaster finds no real problem with that, so long as he’s not forced to speak with the Judge herself; the palace is, after all, one of the safest places in the Underground, and nothing there should remind him of bad memories. (Plus, they have a daycare downstairs.) 

He dresses as nicely as he can, in a purple button-up and a silky black cloak that Thresh had just finished designing. They’d worked as quickly as they could to have it done in time, and Gaster is immensely grateful. He wants to make a good impression; even he, in all his long life, has never been called to stand before the Judge. Sans and Papyrus ride on his back as they head for the Judgement Hall, and he’s glad he didn’t have to leave them behind again. He's nervous to leave them with strangers (and even more nervous to leave Papyrus around other children), but this will hopefully be a very quick visit.

Besides, as long as he’s with them, he can think without anger. He can be  _ himself. _

That will be very important today.

The dust itches and irks him as he walks through Hotland, but it doesn’t send him spiraling again. Once he reaches the palace, he drops the children off at the daycare. He tells the workers about his sons’ unique, er, problems—especially Papyrus’—and they assure him that everything will be monitored carefully, and that they’ll call him as soon as there’s an issue.

“You,” he says, touching his nose to Sans’ skull, “behave, scoundrel.”

“Don’t I always?”

Gaster gives him A Look, and he grins.

“What can I say, pops? I’m five. I’ve got an innate sense of curiosity and very little impulse control.”

“Yeah, yeah. Watch your brother. Make sure he doesn’t get into trouble.”

“Okay, but really—don’t I always?”

“Yes.” Gaster nudges him affectionately. “You do. Now go play. I’ll be back soon.”

He heads upstairs, his claws clicking on the tile. He’s drawn into a little side room before he enters the actual Hall, and one of the guards has him shed his clothing. They take pictures of his wounds, his rotting soul, the collar embedded within his vertebrae. It’s been a while since he felt such humiliation about his physical state, but he certainly feels it when someone’s looking so closely. He does his best not to hunker down or cringe. (He’s not sure how successful he is.)

After that, he redresses, and the guard ushers him to a pair of golden doors. “The Judge is inside,” the guard tells him briskly. “She’ll see you when you’re ready. Best of luck, Dr. Gaster. You should know that we’re all on your side.”

“Thank you,” Gaster murmurs. He takes a deep breath, and then he steps through the doors. He keeps his head held high. He will not hide anything. He will not cower before her; she may be the Royal Judge, but he’s the goddamned Royal Scientist, and he’s not to be cowed. He’s in the right. He  _ knows  _ he’s in the right. 

...so why does he feel this damned guilty?

Golden light spills across the checkered tile. Two quiet gray eyes watch him as he approaches. The Judge sits in the middle of the Hall, her tail coiled around her hind legs and her membranous wings folded neatly behind her. The fins at the tip of her tail flick as he nears her—the only sign of uncertainty he sees.

“Hello, Dr. Gaster,” she says, inclining her head respectfully. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“I wish I could say that same.” Gaster sits before her, curling his own tail around his feet and making sure the spikes at the tip don’t flick, lest she think him uncertain, too. His cloak pools around him, glimmering like spilled ink against the sharp golden light. The Judge isn’t a large wyvern by any means—her head barely comes up to his chest, when they’re both sitting. Still, her size doesn’t fool him. A Judge is chosen for two reasons: they’re capable of precise discernment, and they’re capable of killing almost any other monster in the Underground. 

He has no reason to think her any different.

“Can I interest you in a drink? Tea, coffee? I know this isn’t meant to be a pleasant chat, but there’s no reason to make it awful.”

“No, thank you. The faster we can get this over with, the better.”

“As you wish.” She dips her head again, then lifts her gaze. Her eyes meet his, and they do not look away. “Your name.”

“Dr. Wingdings Gaster.”

“Why are you here?”

“To give my statement regarding the case against Project Blaster.”

“Good. Why else are you here?”

“Because I seek justice for the blatant and vicious abuse of my children.”

“Better.” She strokes her claws through the wiry white hair of her beard, looking solemnly at him. “What happened? Begin on the day you initiated Project Blaster.”

“That’s...a very long story.”

“I would like to hear all of it. Your side of the story is a very interesting one, indeed.”

So he tells her. He tells her about Asgore’s request, about designing the blaster genome sequence, about creating and adopting Sans. He tells her about raising his son, about his encounters with Jackson throughout that time—some of which, he realizes as he looks back, are very odd indeed. He tells her about the night Sans followed him to Jackson’s, about the search for him, about what happened after Jackson found Gaster himself. He tells her about his change. He explains his wounds, his collar. Her eyes flicker with sympathy. 

Through it all, he keeps his voice as brisk and stable as possible, keeps his thoughts straight and clear. He refuses his anger, his hate, his sorrow—he refuses all of it. His voice is hollow, his gaze blank. A story. He’s telling a story, that’s all. He needs no emotional connection to it, not right now.

He finishes by telling her about Papyrus, about his own soulrot and his escape to the Ruins. He tries his best to explain why he was gone for so long, but the words fall hollow on his own ears. Excuses. That’s all they are. Just excuses. He was a coward, to hide from this responsibility for so long. He knows it—and he gets the feeling that she does, too. 

“So that’s it,” he says, finally. His voice is worn. It must have taken at least an hour. “That’s my statement.”

“Thank you.” She shuffles her wings. “I see things more clearly now. There are only a few more pieces to the puzzle—your son, Sans. He’ll be giving his statement soon?”

“Yes, at home, and to trusted friends.”

“The Canine Unit?”

He inclines his head.

“Good. That will be better for them.”

“What do you think so far?” he asks. “Who’s side are you on?”

“I think nothing yet.”

“How can you think nothing? After everything you’ve seen, all of the evidence—”

“Judgement is withheld until I have all pertinent evidence. A missing piece may morph the picture entirely; this is a job that requires patience and a certain level of removal. I will make my decision when the time is right. For now, rest easy knowing that Jackson is secured, and that he won’t be released anytime soon—if at all.” She cocks her head. “What do you want my decision to be?”

“He’s guilty.”

“Perhaps. What would you like me to do about it?”

He falls silent, glancing away.

“Do you think he should be killed?”

“Yes.”

“Do you want me to kill him? Or do you plan to do it yourself?”

He doesn’t respond.

“There’s such hate in your soul, Wingdings Gaster,” the Judge says, circling him. This is the part he dreaded. “Such anger. It will kill you if you aren’t careful.”

“I know.”

“Then why do you cling to it?”

“Is it not deserved?” he demands, looking down at her. She gazes back up at him—quiet, with the peace that comes over centuries and centuries of life and love and loss. “I can do nothing else for those who were lost; this is righteous anger. It is well-earned.”

“Then why do you fear it so?”

“I do not.”

The Judge laughs—a raspy crackle of a sound that sets his teeth on edge. “You’re a practiced liar, aren’t you, doctor?”

He glances away.

“No matter. You can lie to me if you’d like. You can lie to yourself. It does you no good, but do what you feel you must. Your anger stems from a deep wound, and I do not scorn you for it. You’re right. Such anger is well-earned, and it deserves to be felt. Why, then, do you continue to hide from it? Is it to preserve your own self-image? To prove to yourself you’re better than that, better than all we lowlives who dare to feel our emotions? How terribly egotistical of you.”

“That’s not it,” he snaps, prickling.

“Then what is it?”

“I—I—it’s because I’m like  _ this,”  _ he hisses, gesturing to himself. “If I get angry like this, I’m going to  _ hurt people— _ people who don’t deserve to be hurt.”

“Ah.” Her eyes gleam. “Another justification—and not a bad one, eh? But you can’t pretend that’s the only reason. You’re not as selfless as that.”

“No. I’m not. Are there any other flaws you’d like to throw in my face, while you’re at it?”

“Well, if you insist.” She shakes her head, the crest of white fur along her neck flopping. “You’re selfish, and prideful, you spend far too much time wallowing in self-pity, and you’re a damned coward. You hide from your friends, your family, from yourself. You always think you know what’s best, and your morals are looser than they should be. You’ve spent so long being a scientist and a father that you’ve forgotten how to be Wingdings Gaster. Who are you, without your titles? I don’t suppose you even know. You are not a perfect person, and you never will be.”

Gaster’s struggles to keep his head up, refusing to look at her. He knows that. He knows all of those things—they’re the very thoughts that haunt him at night. Hearing them spoken aloud stings, but it won’t cripple him. No one can cripple him as much as he cripples himself.

“But—” She stretches up on her hind feet, and he dares to meet her eyes. They’re warm. “You are patient, and clever, and above all, you are kind. You strive to see the best in your friends. Your intelligence is a gift, and what good use you have made of it. You have worked tirelessly to improve the Underground with your technology, and you have led a team of scientists founded on truth, curiosity, and compassion. You have never harmed another but to defend your friends, your family, and your beliefs. You are good. You have only to keep it that way.”

He shudders. It is this, at last, that brings his head down. She arches her neck and touches her snout to his. She smells like ancient things—rock and wind and earth—and she smells like tea.

“And, more than anything else—” The Judge’s eyes crinkle with joy. “You are loved. You are so very loved. So many people cherish you. You’re a very lucky man, and you ought not waste that luck by continuing to suffer this way. Do what you must to heal, so long as it does not harm another. Your friends and your family, they’ll be with you every step of the way.”

“I know,” he murmurs. “They always are.”

“Like I said.” She drops back to the ground, smiling at him. “A lucky man. Now, then—” She glances back at the other side of the Hall, and he follows her gaze to a thick gray door. Her nostrils flare. “You’d best be going. I’ve business to attend to, so it seems. Get your boys’ statements to me as quickly as you can, please. It’s almost Judgement time.”

He dips his head, then takes his leave. He sits outside of the Hall for moment, taking a moment to simply breathe and collect himself before he heads down to the daycare. The caretaker greets him warmly and tells him that Sans and Papyrus were both very well-behaved.

“Why, the little one just laid around the whole time. Didn’t hear a peep out of him,” the caretaker says. “They both played blocks for a little while, and then had a snack, and now they’re napping up there.” He points up at the indoor playset. Gaster can’t see either of them, but he supposes they’re probably curled up in one of the various nooks scattered through the playset. Papyrus, at least, would have wanted to find himself a small, dark place.

He rears up on his hind legs, bracing his paws against the playset. “Sans?” he calls gently. “Papyrus? Boys, it’s time for us to go.”

A small, slimey child waves at him from inside the playset. He smiles awkwardly. 

“Boys?” he tries again, when he gets no response. “Little ones?”

“Here, let me see if I can find them,” the caretaker offers. “I’ll fit a fair bit better than you can.”

He slips into the twisting tubes and slides of the playset, and Gaster sits back on his haunches and waits anxiously. His soul begins to twist uncomfortably, even as he struggles to breathe and remind himself that they’re fine, they’re safe here, they haven’t been taken. Everything is alright. They’re just resting.

Then the caretaker climbs back out, his eyes wide and frightened, and says, “I can’t find them.”

Gaster’s world shatters again.

* * *

As soon as Dad leaves them in the daycare, Sans gets to work. He plays blocks with Papyrus for a few minutes, plotting his escape. There’s only one caretaker—how hard can it be? Maybe most five-year-olds are easy to corral and placate with playsets and peanut butter crackers, but Sans is no ordinary five-year-old. (Besides, he’s almost  _ six.)  _

Plus, he can warp space-time. That’s always an advantage.

Okay, so in  _ theory  _ he can warp space-time. He’s seen Dad do it, albeit only once. How hard can it be, right? He just ran at a wall, and  _ bam,  _ they went right through it. Sans tries that first. He sets Papyrus down, makes sure to keep a slide between himself and the caretaker, and then rushes the wall as fearlessly as he can.

_ Thunk. _

He crashes back onto his butt, groaning. Papyrus sighs at him. 

“What are you doing?” a tiny snake asks, their tongue flicking. 

“Nothing,” he mutters. 

“Did you get hurt?”

“No.”

“Do you want me to get Mr. Jean?”

“Ugh, no.” 

“Ssssuit yourself,” they say, looking at him like he’s a weirdo. They’re probably not wrong. He waits until they’re gone, then glowers at the wall. He summons his magic and focuses it on the wall, urging it to buckle before him, and then charges it again.

_ Thunk. _

Papyrus arches an eyebrow.

“What?” he asks. “It’s like you’ve never seen a guy run face-first into a wall before.”

The third time, he sits down and really,  _ really  _ concentrates. He thinks about why he’s doing this—he has to get out, to get the files Alphys needs to fix his dad, and he needs to get back before he worries anyone. He has to do this for Dad. He has to make Dad happy again. When he opens his eyes, the universe flickers before him, and he sees her bones. He sees Time.

He jerks back, his soul pounding. Holy shit, okay. He is...not doing that again, wow.

“New plan,” he tells Papyrus. “New less-creepy plan.”

They both climb to the top of the playset, and Sans eyes the vent on the wall. He reaches out with his magic, manipulates the gravity around the vent screws until they come loose, and then pushes the vent cover back into the actual vent. After that, he levitates himself (and then Papyrus, who is more than willing to come with him once he realizes he’s being left alone) over. He shuts the vent behind them, then leads the way through the ducts, banging his elbows and knees and skull the whole way. Papyrus slinks along behind him, dragging himself on his belly.

He peers through each vent grate as they reach it, until he finds what he hopes he’s looking for—a dim gray room filled with boxes and biohazard bags and there, along the wall, several broken incubators. He swallows hard, then gets to work unlatching the grate. He lowers himself and Papyrus to the floor with his magic—Papyrus looks particularly uncomfortable with their surroundings, and he sticks close to Sans’ side.

“Just a few minutes,” he promises his little brother. “Remember, it’s for Dad.”

He sneaks through the room, careful not to touch anything, until he stumbles upon cabinets and cabinets of papers. He groans. This is going to take longer than he thought it would. After opening each cabinet, he scans through the files and binders for any key titles. He’s in luck; one binder has the words Post-Maturity Transformations, and a small manilla folder has the words GB01. For a second, he almost passes over the GB01 folder, but something tugs at the back of his mind. GB—that’s not normal. It’s supposed to be GBP; his father explained that to him, once. He tugs the folder out and flips to the first page.

_ Gaster Blaster.  _ Not a prototype, no, that’s right. His father is  _ the  _ Gaster Blaster. Sans sits down with both the binder and the folder, crossing his legs. For a few minutes, he flips through the pages—most of it is a hodgepodge of words and terms he doesn’t really understand, like stem cell transfusions, osteoblasts and osteoclasts, PTH and calcitonin. Scattered amongst those words are sketches of blasters and equipment and a map of the Underground scribbled on in red ink. He sets that binder aside; hopefully Alphys can make sense of it. 

The next folder is...worse.

The first page is a chart of his dad’s stats. His name, his birthdate, his weight and height and health. The next page is a picture of him as a normal skeleton, and he’s—

He’s floating in a tube of clear red solution. Wires and tubes surround him, leading to enormous machines. There’s a print-out of several charts on the back of that page, and Sans swallows hard. In the photo, Dad’s eyes are open, but his eyesockets are completely black. On the next page, there’s another photo, but in this one, Dad has started to morph. His skull is warped, crested at the back. His bones are unnaturally thick in some places, twisted and thin in others. It’s not right.

The collar is already beginning to sink into his vertebrae.

His fingers trembling, Sans turns to the next page. This one is farther into the transformation—his father’s back curves unnaturally, his tailbone beginning to lengthen. One shoulder blade has gravitated to the side, but the other remains on his back, giving him a lopsided appearance. His right leg has broken to make way for the hock; the hominid femur is beginning to dissolve as a draconic femur grows in its place. 

As Sans flips through the pages, he watches his father transform for the first time. It takes days and days, and each moment is agony. He can’t hear it, but it’s clear enough that Dad is shrieking in pain, his back arching and his claws skittering across the inside of the tube. Sans has never seen anyone so scared, so hurt, so...hopeless. He certainly never thought Dad would look like that. It breaks his heart, and he scrubs furiously at the tears rolling down his face. He feels sick. That look on his father’s face—that’s an agony Sans has never seen before. It’s an agony he didn’t know existed. 

The next folder is for GBP134. He flips through pages and pages of data and pictures. He watches as Jackson mutilates Papyrus’ tiny body with scalpels and bone shears, reads through the methods he used to teach him to hunt and track and fight. He reads all the hideous ways Jackson turned his baby brother into a weapon, and anger digs teeth into his bones.

Behind him, he hears his blasters snap their teeth in rage. 

His blasters.

He glances back, and five pairs of glowing white eyelights glance back at him. He’s never summoned them before, but they’re as familiar to him as his own hands. They’re as angry as he is; he can feel their rage, hot and bitter. They want to attack Jackson. They want to attack anyone who ever  _ looks  _ at Sans’ family the wrong way. 

He thinks he’d like to let them.

The change takes him, for the first time, by force. Anger washes over him in a black wave, and with it, magic. His bones ache and twist; he starts to fight it, and pain sears through him. He hisses through his teeth and drops to his knees, lets the magic wash through him instead. The pain dissipates. His fingers curl into talons, his legs recurve, his skull warps and lengthens. 

_ Fight,  _ his blasters hiss, their heads hovering around him. He digs his claws into the floor, shivering violently.  _ We’ll fight. _

But there isn’t anyone  _ to  _ fight. There’s just him, small and alone and scared in a room of horrors. Papyrus hides underneath a table, staring at him with wide eyes—more aptly, staring at his blasters. They loom above him, their eyes gleaming, their fangs glossy in the fluorescent light. Their bloodlust (his bloodlust, he is them and they are him) thrums through him.

The door cracks open.

Magic whines and hums, and in a split second, the room is awash with white light. His chest burns, and his jaws snap open against his will—a blast of magic surges forward, slamming into the doorway alongside the other blasters’ blasts. When the dust clears, a wyvern stands in front of him; in front of her, a shield made of thick green magic. His blasts haven’t even singed her.

How pathetic.

He faces the wyvern, panting with anxiety. His bones rattle. He gets ready to dodge.

“Oh,” the wyvern says softly. “Hello there, little Judge. I thought you might make your way here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: wyverns are pretty closely related to dragons, although they're not the same species! they tend to come in duller colors (monochromes and browns, mostly), and their wings are their forelimbs. they're quite capable of flight (they use their lil tail fins to steer, much like dragons), although they don't possess any elemental magic like fire-breathing, etc. they're very good climbers, and tend to be more lithe and agile than dragons. they're rare now, but not extinct, and the Judge is the oldest one in the Underground.


	25. A LITTLE BURN

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to violence/child abuse/child neglect/unethical science/body horror/torture
> 
> arT MORE ART MORE MORE ART MORE ART AAAAAAAAAAAAA!!
> 
> [here](https://mirkrali.tumblr.com/post/611681241554632704/blackout-for-parsnipit-for-their-fic-algernon) is some absolutely incredible art of A Very Angry Gaster Blaster Gaster by @mirkrali ! 
> 
> and [here](https://ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber.tumblr.com/post/611449344479084544/the-warrior) we have mr. grillby bein an adorable badass in his pajamas !!! (a scene from chapter twenty-two, done by @ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber!)
> 
> thank you both so much a;lgkdj;ln i am Blessed

Sans scoops the folders he needs into his jaws, clamping his teeth tightly around them. He puts his skull down, then rushes forward, fully intending to slip between the wyvern’s legs—but she steps out of his way first. He tumbles out into the Judgement Hall, then whirls around to search for Papyrus. His little brother stares at him from the evidence locker, wide-eyed and confused; Sans can’t blame him. It’s been some time since Sans has been in this form around him—he can only hope that Papyrus recognizes him by sound and scent.

“Paps, come on,” he says, skittering backwards as the wyvern swings her head around to look at him. “Come on!”

Papyrus hesitates only a moment longer, then springs forward and places himself between Sans and the wyvern. He stares up at her, bristling his spines and growling—a reedy, childish threat in the face of a wyvern who’s undoubtedly killed more monsters than Sans has met. There’s no way he stands a chance against her. There’s no way Sans stands a chance against her, either. But together—

Together, maybe they’ll be alright.

Sans steps forward, standing next to his brother. His stub of a tail tries valiantly to lash, and his blasters amass behind him, their jaws clicking. The folders crumple between his teeth, and his jaws ache with the urge to bite. Magic stutters in his soul again, sparks and itches along his ribs in the urge to blast. 

The wyvern looks...sad.

“You’ve nothing to fear,” she assures them. “I won’t hurt either one of you.”

Golden light spills over his shoulders, floods his eyesockets. This place feels...familiar. It fills his soul with an ancient dread, and his bones rattle. He doesn’t want to be here. He’s not ready. The horror of what he’s seen tarnishes him; it fills him with a rage that belongs in this Hall and this Hall only, but this time—

This time, there’s nothing he can do about it. There is no evil to slaughter. There is no world to defend. There’s only him, his little brother, his father, and the shadows that lurk in their souls. He glances at his claws; they seem so very small, so very inept. How is he going to defend himself? How is he going to defend anyone else?

...why is he always so helpless?

“What have you got with you?” the wyvern asks.

“Nothing,” Sans says, his voice muffled around the folders. 

She cocks her head, ancient eyes glinting with amusement. “A little joker, are we?”

“Who are you?” Sans demands, cramming the folders into his hoodie and holding them there with a flicker of blue magic. “What do you want?”

“I am the Judge of the Underground,” the wyvern says, and Sans’ soul drops out of his chest. Oh  _ crap.  _ Of all the people who could have possibly caught him, it had to be the  _ Judge.  _ Dad’s going to be so mad. Dad is going to be so mad, oh no, oh  _ no,  _ Sans is going to be in so much trouble—

“Don’t tell my dad,” he says, first, and the wyvern arches an eyebrow. “Please.”

“Let’s start from the beginning.” She sits, lifting a hind foot to scratch behind her horns. “Who are you two?”

“You—you don’t know?”

“It wouldn’t do to assume things. Please, introduce yourselves.”

“I’m Sans.” The act of conversation itself soothes his anger, and his blasters start to glitch and warp behind him. Relived, he allows them to dissolve, their magic flooding back into his soul. “This is my brother, Papyrus.”

“A pleasure to meet you both, though I would it were under more pleasant circumstances. What are you both doing here?”

Sans’ eyes flick away from her.

“Honesty is important. I can only help you if you let me,” the Judge says, “and I do want to help you. Perhaps you find that hard to believe, after everything you’ve been through, and I can’t say I blame you. I can only ask you to have a little bit of trust.”

Sans hunches his shoulders. Trust? Trust an  _ adult?  _ A  _ stranger?  _ One who’s big and powerful enough to hold him down and hurt him and—

He shudders. Papyrus leans against him.

“Look at me. Tell me what you see.”

Sans looks uncertainly back at her. “You’ve a wyvern.”

“Good. What else?”

“You’re—old?”

She chuckles. “Quite correct. Look beyond the outside, though—you know well how to do it. You’ve done it before, I’m sure. What does your soul see, when you look at me?”

“What?”

“What do you feel? Look at me. Remember nothing else. What says your soul?”

Sans hesitates, but he—tries. He looks at her, and he tries to see beyond the outside, beyond fear and dread and sour, darkened memories. 

...he fails.

“I can’t.”

She lets out a soft breath, dipping her head. “Well, I appreciate the effort. Since I cannot make you trust me—and with good reason—I will offer you an incentive. If you have an honest conversation with me, I will do what I can to help you. If you refuse, I will have no choice but to retrieve your father and let him deal with you as he will—and I will be taking those files back at once. Now, what would you prefer?”

Sans grumbles, then lets the folders fall back to the ground. “I’m taking these. They’re about my dad—I want to change him back to how he used to be.”

“Ah, little one.” The Judge sits, coiling her tail around her legs. “An impossible task.”

“No it’s not! He can change back, I know he can.”

There’s a deep, ancient sadness in her eyes when she looks at him, and he quakes before it. “There are some things which, once lost, cannot return. The sooner you accept that—”

“No!” He snaps his jaws, bristling. Beside him, Papyrus begins to growl. “He’s going to be okay again. He’s going to shift back, and he’s going to stop being scared, and once you deal with Jackson everything will be just like it used to be.”

“You’ve already judged your father, then.”

“What?”

“Tell me what you see when you look at him,” she says, her eyes focused and sharp. “Tell me how you judged him.”

“I haven’t—”

“Of course you have. Only consider it. What do you see, when you look at him?”

“I—I see—”

He sees a half-formed blaster crying in a tube, helpless and alone and afraid. A heavy head on the snow, black magic dripping between its molars. A ribcage heaving for breath, paws scrambling across the carpet. A fractured skull and a blackened soul. Pierced palms. Vomit. Wild eyes from nightmares and rattling bones to scare away the world. An empty space where a father should be. Boiling anger and rolling growls and the putrid stink of hatred. 

He sees his father dying in the snow.

“Please stop,” he says, stumbling away from the Judge. “I don’t want to do this anymore. I just want to go—please can I go?”

“Oh, little one.” There’s grief in her voice. He hates it. “I can’t simply allow you to take evidence before the Judgement.”

“I need it. I  _ need  _ to change him back.”

“Do you think this is the way to do it? Going behind his back, stealing files, frightening him so?”

“Frightening?”

“You should know better than to run off and disappear—only think of how it affects your father. He’s lost you once already, the poor dear. What’s he going to think when he notices you missing in a few moments?”

Oh, crap. Oh, crap crap crap he does need to get back to the daycare soon—

He snags the files again, slipping them into his ribcage so they won’t make odd lumps in his hoodie. “I’m taking these,” he says, bristling his spines, “unless you want to steal them from me.”

She arches an eyebrow.  _ “I’m  _ the thief here?”

“Well I’m not giving them back, so—”

“Is that truly your best judgement?”

“Yes!”

“You’ve a lot to learn, then. Let the consequences of this judgement teach you something.” She lowers her head, snaking it forward until their muzzles are inches from each other. “You may have the files for three days. After that, I am sending someone to retrieve them. Now, you’d best get back to the daycare. Your father is—”

Outside of the Hall, he hears some dreadful monster begin to roar. 

“—not very pleased with your absence.” The Judge winces. “Best of luck.”

Sans gulps and bolts towards the doors, shoving his way through them. They’re damned  _ heavy.  _ He holds them open for Papyrus, then races down the stairs. Papyrus scurries after him, whining in agitation. They whip around the corner and Sans freezes. Papyrus slams into his haunches, and they both skid to a stop.

Dad looms in front of the daycare, his eyes blazing purple. Magic writhes within his chest, and his claws crunch through the floor. He lifts his head, his lower jaw clacking angrily. The caretaker cowers at his feet, petrified. 

Sans races forward. “Dad! Dad, we’re okay, we’re right here.”

Dad’s head snaps down so fast Sans flinches. “Sans?” he asks. His voice cracks with fear, and he nudges Sans urgently. “Papyrus? You’re alright?”

“Yeah.” Sans reaches up, resting his paws on Dad’s muzzle. His father’s bones shudder. “I’m really sorry, we were just—”

“Where the  _ hell were you?”  _ Dad snarls, yanking his head up again so he can glower down at them. Sans winces and shrinks into himself. Papyrus tucks his tail, trembling. “I told you to stay put! What were you  _ thinking?  _ Didn’t you learn anything from what happened  _ last time  _ you ran off without an adult?”

“I—I’m sorry, Dad, I—”

“Sorry doesn’t keep you safe, does it? And taking Papyrus with you! I trusted you to be  _ responsible  _ with him. Perhaps that was too much to expect of a five-year-old.” Dad paces back and forth, his spines bristling. “I can’t believe this. I thought you knew better than that, Sans.”

Sans’ eyes sting. He scrubs his hands furiously across them, taking a deep breath. Panic twists in his chest, and for a moment, everything feels very—very overwhelming. But he knew this would happen, didn’t he? He knew Dad would be mad if he caught Sans sneaking around again. It’s—fine. It’s fine.

“I know. I’m—I won’t do it ever again.”

“No,” Dad says, his voice chilled. “You won’t.”

Dad stalks towards the doors, and Sans slinks after him. He has to trot to keep up, and Papyrus lags behind, cringing in their father’s shadow. Dad doesn’t pick them up until they reach Waterfall, and as he scoops Sans into his jaws, he doesn’t say a word. Papyrus shrinks away from him, but Dad picks him up anyway, depositing him next to Sans. As soon as they’re home, Dad sets them both on the ground and kicks the front door shut.

“So?” he demands. Sans cringes. “Where were you today?”

“I wanted to go see Asgore.” A lie he’d thought up on the long, tense way home. There’s no way he can tell Dad the truth, especially not when he’s  _ this  _ angry. (Stars, but Sans hates to think of how angry he’ll be when the Guard comes looking for those stolen files. Maybe this...wasn’t the best decision he could have made.)

“And why could you not have  _ told  _ me that? I could have left you with him in the first place. I need to know where you are, Sans!”

“I know.” He hunches his shoulders, stares at his paws. “‘m sorry.”

“What if you had gotten lost?” Dad demands. “What if you had gotten hurt, or been taken again? What would I do then?”

Sans shuffles his paws. He gets a feeling that’s a rhetorical question.

“You can’t keep doing this, and it’s so  _ frustrating,  _ because there’s nothing I can do to stop you, short of keeping an eye on you 24/7. You’re too smart, Sans, and sooner or later you’ll be able to teleport. What will I do to keep track of you then? Should I just let you run wild, wherever you will? Is that what you want?”

“No,” he whispers.

“Then what  _ do  _ you want? Why won’t you just  _ listen?” _

He just—he just wanted to help. Pressure builds in his chest, and he gulps it down.

“Damn it,” Dad hisses, snapping his teeth.  _ “Damn it,  _ Sans.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I told you, sorry doesn’t cut it.” He sits, hunching his shoulders. “Go to your room.”

Sans heads for the stairs, relieved to escape. Papyrus begins to follow him, but Dad snakes a paw out and pulls him back. 

“Papyrus stays here,” he says.

“What? How come?”

“Because you won’t go anywhere without him. That’s the only way I can keep you around right now, isn’t it?” he says, his voice bitter. “Go. He’ll be fine.”

“But—”

“What?” Dad demands. “You think I’d hurt him?”

Sans shakes his head quickly. “No. I just—I’ll—” He makes a frustrated sound, then bounds up the rest of the stairs and stalks into his room. Downstairs, Papyrus whines in distress. Sans’ soul twists, and he shifts back into his regular form, sitting down against his bed and hugging himself tightly.

Only once he’s away from his father—from that fragile, darkened soul—does he break. He snags a pillow and muffles his sobs against it, his shoulders shaking. He didn’t want to make Dad that mad. He really, really didn’t. He’d wanted to get back to the daycare in time, he’d wanted to give the folders to Alphys and have her figure everything out and then when she  _ did  _ Dad would be so happy he’d forgive Sans for running off in the first place, and Sans could have  _ helped  _ him for once. Sans  _ certainly  _ didn’t want to put anymore upset into his father’s soul on purpose. (God knows it can only take so much before it shatters completely.)

When he thinks, now, on the terrible things he’s learned, the terrible things he’s  _ seen,  _ his chest aches sharply. The images of Papyrus in the lab, cowering and broken, haunt him. The memory of his father, writhing in hopeless agony—it refuses to leave his mind. He doesn’t think these horrible things will ever quite leave him, and it makes him nauseous, and he shakes and shakes and shakes. 

...a few minutes later, he hears little bone claws scraping against his bedroom door. He scrambles up, wipes his eyes, and cracks the door open. Papyrus squeezes inside. Down on the first floor, Dad curls up tighter and doesn’t say anything.

Sans lets out a wobbly sigh and shuts the door again. Papyrus climbs into his lap, whining urgently, and Sans hugs him. “It’s okay, buddy,” he murmurs, and Papyrus sniffs his face and his throat and his shoulders. “We’ll figure this out. It’s just gonna take a little time, that’s all. Look, I’m gonna give these papers to Alphys so she can find a way to turn Dad back to normal. He’ll be happy then, but—but he’s gonna be really angry first. You don’t need to be scared of him, though, okay? He’d never hurt us. Never, ever.”

If there’s one thing Sans is sure of, it’s that. No matter how angry Dad gets, he still cares about them. And not like pets, either, like  _ people.  _ No matter how badly Sans messes things up (and he has messed everything up  _ very badly) _ , his dad still loves him. If he can just cling to that one vital truth, then things will—things will be okay.

...right?

* * *

“Sans?” Dad knocks on his door shortly before dinner. Papyrus retreats beneath the bed as Sans opens the door. Dad crouches in front of his room, his body draped down the hallway. He looks utterly miserable. “I’m sorry, little one.”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s really not. You needn’t make excuses for me. I shouldn’t have raised my voice—that wasn’t nice, and you didn’t deserve it. I’ll try not to do it again.” 

Sans...doubts he’s going to be able to keep that assurance, when he finds out what Sans has done. “And I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have left without telling you; I knew you’d worry.”

“Well, I would appreciate it if you’d tell me next time,” Dad admits. “I fear I hold you to too high of a standard, though—you  _ are  _ only five.”

“Almost six,” Sans points out.

“Yes. We’ll have to start planning your birthday soon, won’t we?”

Sans nods earnestly, glad to have a normal topic of conversation to latch onto. He doesn’t want to dwell on what he’s done anymore—because if he thinks about it for too long (if he looks at his father for too long) he remembers all the dreadful things he now knows. He remembers suffering, he remembers heartache and torture and—

He breathes and tears his gaze away from Dad.

“What theme would you like?” Dad asks hopefully. “For the party?”

“Mm— _ Spirit  _ themed.”

“ _ Spirit? _ ”

“Yeah, that movie we watched, with the horses.”

“Ah.” A smile flickers across Dad’s face. “Very well. I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, would you like to go to Grillby’s for dinner?”

Sans glances at Papyrus. “I don’t know if Paps would like it. It’s pretty crowded.”

“That’s alright. I called and ordered ahead, so we can just swing by to say hello and grab our food.”

“So the question was a matter of politeness.”

Dad smiles sheepishly. “You always agree to Grillby’s.”

“True that, pops.” He kneels in front of his bed, patting his hand on the ground. “C’mere, Paps. Let’s go see Grillby and grab some food.”

Papyrus slinks out from under the bed, eyeing Dad warily, and Sans scoops him up.

“And I’m sorry to you as well, little one,” Dad says, leaning forward and touching his nose to Papyrus’ skull. Papyrus reaches up and sets one solemn paw on his muzzle, but doesn’t lean away. “I shouldn’t act so angrily around you—around either one of you—and I certainly shouldn’t have used you against your brother. That wasn’t good.”

Sans hitches Papyrus up, relaxing slightly. That’s more like the Dad he knows, safe and sweet and gentle. He can only hope that, once Dad gets back to normal, he’ll stay that way. Together, the three of them head downstairs and over to Grillby’s. Dad waits outside of the bar with Papyrus, who snaps his teeth curiously at the snow and eyes Belous as though he expects to be murdered. As Dad and Belous begin to chat, Sans slips into the restaurant; it’s far too crowded for Papyrus, and Dad won’t fit without stepping on someone.

_ Hello there, Sans,  _ Grillby signs when he sees him.

Sans climbs up onto one of the bar stools.  _ Heya, Grillbz. Dad said you had food for us. _

_ Don’t I always? _

The elemental vanishes into the back room, then returns with a large paper bag. It smells like grease and salt and all things good, and Sans reaches eagerly for it.  _ Ketchup? _

_ There are at least ten packets inside already. _

_ Cool. Thanks, man. _

_ It’s no problem, though at times I do fear I’m enabling your growing ketchup addiction. _

_ You are my  _ favorite  _ enabler. Never doubt it. _

_...Sans? _

_ Yeah? _

_ How is your father? _

Sans glances back. Something must flicker across his face, because Grillby grows smokier with his worry.  _ He’s—okay. You know. As okay as he can be. Actually, um—can I ask you a favor? _

_ You can ask. _

_ Can I borrow your phone? I need to call Alphys. It’s about Dad. _

Grillby hesitates.  _ You shouldn’t keep secrets from your family. _

_ It’s not a secret. I’m gonna tell him, but I don’t want to get his hopes up for nothing. Alphys has to tell me whether or not it’s even  _ possible,  _ first. _

_ You’re trying to change him back. _

Sans shrugs.  _ Well, he’s not happy this way. He’s not himself. _

_ Little one, I think that has more to do with his trauma than what form he finds himself in. What he’s been through—it’s changed him. He’s still learning to deal with it. He needs time. _

_ Maybe,  _ Sans grudgingly admits,  _ but the form’s not helping. He hates it, and he’s upset all the time, and he just—he feels  _ angry  _ so much now, even if he hides it, and I just—maybe if he changes back, he’ll feel a little better, and he won’t be so—so— _

Sans makes a frustrated noise, waving his hands.

Grillby crackles softly, reaching out to set a hand on his skull.  _...he’s that angry, huh? _

_ I mean—he doesn’t  _ want  _ to be, I think. At least, not at—most people. _

_ No. Of course not. Your father fears his anger more than most. Tell you what, I’ll let you call Alphys if you tell me what she says. I want to help Wings, too. He— _ Grillby flickers pink at the edges.  _ He means a lot to me, you know. _

_ Why are you blushing?  _ Sans leans forward, studying him critically.

_ I’m not! I’m just—it’s hot in here.  _ Grillby tugs at his collar, his flames growing pinker.

_ You’re made of literal fire. _

Grillby shoves a phone in his direction.  _ Just make your phonecall, you little hooligan, and leave me alone. _

Sans makes a face, but gladly takes the phone and dials Alphys. As per usual, she only picks up on the final ring. “H-hello?”

“Hi, Alphys. It’s Sans.” He peeks at the windows—Dad is involved in what appears to be an enthusiastic political debate with Belous.

“Oh, Sans! How are you?”

“‘m good. Hey—” He lowers his voice. “I got those papers you needed. Where do you want me to put them? I can leave them at Grillby’s, if you want to swing by later.”

For a moment, the line crackles with silence. Then—“Y-yes, leave them there. I’ll pick them up tonight.”

“Awesome. Thanks, Alphys.”

“It’s, um, it’s no problem,” Alphys says, although she sounds uncertain. (But when doesn’t she?) “I want to make your dad happy, too. If this is how we can do that, t-then—” She gulps. “Then we’ll do it this way, I g-guess.”

Once Sans hangs up, he pulls the files from his ribcage and shoves them in Grillby’s direction.  _ Can you watch these, please? Alphys will come pick them up tonight. _

_...I don’t like going behind Wings’ back like this. _

_ I know, I know, but it’s for his own good. _

_ Don’t you think he must be tired of people deciding things like that for him? _

_ I’m not gonna keep this from him forever. I just need to figure some stuff out first, and then I’ll tell him everything right away. If I tell him now and then Alphys says it’s not even gonna be possible to change him back, he’ll be crushed and you know it. He needs good news only, right now. So are you gonna help or not? _

Grillby sighs and takes the papers.  _ What are these, anyway? _

_ Just science stuff. Um. I guess I can’t keep you from looking at them, but—they’re not good. You won’t like it. _

Grillby flickers red for a moment, then fades back to his normal gold and inclines his head.  _ I understand. Thank you for the warning. You’d best be going, now—I think Wings is beginning to wonder where you are. And Sans? _

_ Yeah? _

_ Don’t hide things from your father much longer. It isn’t good for either of you. _

...that’s unfortunately familiar advice. Sans dredges up a grin, then grabs his paper bag and races back outside. “Dinner is served,” he says cheerfully, and Papyrus bounds over to sniff at the bag before wrinkling his nose. “Yes, I know, I know, it’s too greasy for you. What’d you get for him, Dad?”

“Apples and a grilled cheese.”

“What’d you get for  _ me?” _

“A hamburger, duh.”

Sans leads the way back to the house, his father and brother padding along behind him. Once they’re home, he unpacks their food. Papyrus digs into his meal without a single bit of encouragement, his tail actually  _ wagging, _ and Sans’ soul warms. Dad downs his enormous serving of fries in a few gulps, humming happily. Sans smothers his hamburger in ketchup, then wolfs it down and scrapes his fingers clean against his teeth.

After dinner, the three of them lounge around the house watching cartoons. Dad reads them a few books—Papyrus looks at the pictures, rapt, and Sans watches them both with adoration. He also watches the phone with anticipation, waiting for Alphys to call, but she never does. He supposes it might take more than a few hours to figure all that science stuff out, but he’s still disappointed. They’ve only got two days left with those papers. 

He hopes Alphys is smart enough to make copies of them.

* * *

“Sans?” Dad calls, late the next morning. “Phone for you.”

Sans bolts down the stairs so fast Papyrus startles as he runs past. “Who is it?”

“It’s Alphys. She’s just calling to check up on us,” Dad says, handing him the phone. 

Sans clutches the phone to the side of his skull, trying to appear calm and collected as his father ambles back towards the kitchen. “Uh—hi, Alphys. How are you?”

“I’m good,” Alphys says. “I’ve got some big news for you. Is, uh—is Dr. Gaster l-listening?”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Okay. In that case, um—a-according to these notes, Jackson used stem cells from a GBP01 sample.”

“That’s me.”

“Y-yes, exactly! I didn’t find references to any cellular editing he’d done to those cells, so I presume that your f-father’s form is now extremely similar to your own. W-what that means, in theory, is that he should be able to transform the way you can. I’m not sure why he c-can’t. Ideally, I could get a bone scraping from him to really look at his genotype, but that might be a l-little suspicious.”

“Yeah, just a little. Did you find anything else about—” He cups his hand over his mouth, checks to make sure Dad is still in the kitchen. “—how he’s supposed to transform?”

“I’m afraid not. There were notes regarding how to  _ prevent  _ that, t-though, which really makes me think that he should be able to.”

“How was he going to prevent it?”

“The collar—disabling your dad’s magic.”

“But we turned the collar off. It shouldn’t be able to stop him anymore.”

“I c-can’t tell you any more than that, Sans. But get this—the full transformation was supposed to take a month. Your dad was only gone for a few weeks. U-unless the transformation progressed more rapidly than Jackson anticipated, I don’t even think your dad’s done changing.”

Dread curls beneath Sans’ sternum. “What does that mean? He’ll get worse?”

“I don’t know,” Alphys admits. “I’m s-sorry, Sans. If he hasn’t been changing for the past month, then I doubt he’s just going to start now. Maybe he won’t change anymore, since h-he’s out of solution. If he can just figure out to ch-change back to his hominid form, he might be okay.”

“Okay, so how is he gonna change back?”

“I, uh—I don’t know that, either. By all accounts, he should be able to change at will. If—if I was to give you a personal opinion, I’d say he’s too afraid.”

“What? Why? He  _ wants _ to be normal again.”

“Yes, but what he went through—” Alphys’ voice shudders, her breath hitching. “It’s no wonder he can’t change back. I’d be p-petrified to go through, um, to go through something like that again. It must have hurt him terribly.”

“Yeah.” Sans swallows hard, the image of his father shrieking in pain flashing through his mind. “...yeah, it did. So you think maybe he just needs to stop being afraid?”

“M-maybe. I don’t know that it’s going to be that easy, though. If—and this is a big  _ if— _ but if the b-blaster form is stronger, he might be clinging to it as a sort of defensive mechanism. If he doesn’t feel safe, then w-why would he want to change back into a weaker form? D-does that make sense?”

Sans thinks about the change, thinks about his own blaster form overcoming him in his fear and his  _ rage  _ back in the evidence locker—“Yeah. That makes a lot of sense, actually.”

“So, right now, I think the best course of action is to just l-let him recover. Talk to him about this. Is he in t-therapy yet?”

“I think he set up an appointment for next week.”

“Good. He n-needs it. And what about you?”

“Uh—yeah. Us too.”

“It’s not so b-bad, you’ll see. I bet you’ll have fun.”

Sans makes an unconvinced noise. “It’s mostly for Papyrus.”

“Y-you don’t think you need it?”

Sans shrugs, then realizes she can’t see him through the phone. “I mean, maybe a little, but not as much as Paps. You know how he is.”

“Yeah. Um. H-how is he?”

“He’s good.” Sans brightens, more than happy to talk about his baby brother. “Still, y’know, shy and jumpy, but doing better. He seems to be hiding under things less. I think he’s finally getting used to the house.”

The two of them chat a while longer, and then Sans hands the phone back to Dad. He’s got a lot to think about, now. A lot to think about—and only two days to think about it. He takes a deep breath, heads upstairs, and gets started.

* * *

Sans stuffs Papyrus’ calcium supplement pill into a cube of cheese, then tosses it to him. It gets snapped out of the air, and Papyrus wags his tail vigorously as he bolts the cheese down. “You want your pill in cheese, old man?” he asks, rattling the pill bottle in Dad’s direction. 

“No.” Dad scoffs, affronted, then pauses. He leans forward, sniffing the cheese bag. “Okay, maybe.”

Sans stuffs another pill into the cheese, tossing it to Dad before reluctantly downing one himself. “Can I go play outside?” he asks—ordinarily he wouldn’t want to be outside of the house without Dad, but he has something special he wants to look into today.

“After you finish your breakfast,” Dad says. “You promise you’ll stay nearby?”

Sans nods earnestly. “Pinky promise.”

The three of them finish their breakfast, and then Sans bolts to the backyard with Papyrus on his heels. Dad stays inside to make appointments—it’s seems like that’s all he does, anymore. Sans sits down near the center of the yard, taking a deep breath. Papyrus lays down next to him, as prim and proper as ever. 

“Alright, buddy,” Sans says. “Let’s see if we can do this when we’re  _ not  _ freaking out.”

He reaches for his magic, taps into the constant ebb and flow of it, and summons his blasters. Papyrus stiffens. When Sans opens his eyes, two draconic skulls float in front of him. A grin cracks across his face. They’re both small, and their eyelights aren’t terribly bright, but they’re  _ here. _

“Hey, guys,” he says, laughing. “Hi. It’s, uh—it’s nice to finally, actually meet you.”

Papyrus begins to growl. 

“No, look, it’s okay.” Sans pets his skull gently, pointing at the blasters.  _ Friends,  _ he signs.  _ Our friends.  _ “They’re mine. They’re my magic. They’ll protect us if we need them to, so you don’t need to be afraid of ‘em. They’d never, ever hurt you.”

Papyrus’ growl cuts off, but he still eyes the blasters poisonously. 

“Alright, let’s see—um, move?” he tries. The blasters stare blankly at him. “Go up? Go to the side?”  _ Up,  _ he signs.  _ Left.  _ “Nada, huh? Okay. Maybe—”

He furrows his brow, focusing. He grasps his magic and feels the blasters come to attention, their eyelights brightening.  _ Up,  _ he says, threading the command through his magic. The blasters lift. “Yes! Just like that.” He beams, standing up. Papyrus rises, leaning against his legs. “Alright, now—” 

_ Down.  _ The blasters move down.  _ Left, right. Stop there. Okay, showstopper—get ready for a blast. _

He pushes his energy towards the blasters, and they gulp it down hungrily. Magic begins to swirl between their jaws, and a low whine fills the air. Then he snaps his energy away from them, and the blasts dissipate—best not to waste that much magic if he can avoid it. He practices with them for a while longer, then pulls his magic back into himself and dissolves them.

He is  _ so freaking excited to show Dad. _

Sans bounds back inside, skidding to a stop in the living room. His dad lays curled up on the rug, his head on the couch. He’s sleeping. In his sleep, his claws twitch, and his spines bristle. A low, deadly growl rattles between his ribs. Papyrus hooks his teeth through the back of Sans’ pant leg, whining and pulling him backwards. 

“Dad?”

Dad jerks, his eyes snapping open. His growl spikes briefly before cutting off sharply; he shakes his head muzzily. “Sans…?”

“Yeah. Are you okay?”

“Yes, I’m—fine. I’m sorry. I must have fallen asleep.” He sits up, rubbing a paw across his eyes. “I was having the most wonderful dream.”

Sans swallows hard.

“Did you need something?” Dad asks, looking expectantly at him. 

“Um—yeah, actually. I was hoping that—do you maybe wanna practice fighting with me? We haven’t had a chance to since we left Toriel’s.”

“Sure,” Dad says, his tail wagging briefly. “If that’s what you want.”

Sans leads the way outside, trying his hardest to appear totally chill despite the tumult of emotion in his chest—fortunately, that’s something he’s had quite a bit of practice with, this past month. He squares off with his father, who crouches at the far end of the yard, his tail flicking. 

“Do you remember what I taught you?” he asks. Several small pebbles begin to float, surrounded by a halo of blue magic. “Dodge, little one.”

So Sans dodges. Dad doesn’t go easy on him—by the time it’s Sans’ turn, he’s panting. His excitement is enough to drive his exhaustion away, though. Just wait until dad sees  _ this! _

“My turn, old man,” he says, his eyes shining. “Are you ready?”

Dad crouches, splays his claws and waggles his haunches, as though preparing to pounce. “Do your worst, filial fiend.”

Sans lifts his hand, and then he summons his blasters. They hover, one over each shoulder, and he grins victoriously. His dad’s eyes widen, and he gapes up at them. That expression alone is enough to have Sans laughing, and the blasters laugh along with him, their mouths open and happy. 

“Sans!” Dad bounds forward, his eyes shining. “Blasters! You have blasters! When—how—”

“Just today,” Sans says. “What do you think? Pretty cool, huh?”

“They’re incredible,” Dad breathes, studying each one fervently before nuzzling against them. They grin their doggy grins, their eyesockets squeezing shut in delight as they nuzzle Dad back. “Stars, Sans— _ you’re  _ incredible. I’m so proud of you.” He drops his head, pushing his muzzle against Sans’ chest. “Well done, little one.”

“Thanks.” Sans flushes with delight, hugging Dad’s muzzle. “Heh—I was trying to make a dramatic introduction. Did it work?”

“I should say so.” Dad chuffs happily, leaning up to sniff the blasters again. “Do they respond to you?”

“Yep.” Sans guides the blasters up and down and back. “I was practicing while you napped.”

“Goodness, they’re so well-formed! I doubt you could tell them apart if you tried. They look just like you. You know, minus the body.”

“You think?” Sans squints up at them. “Huh. I guess they do.”

“Well, they  _ are  _ you. They’re just other bodies—other selves. That’s how I’ve always thought of mine, anyhow. They don’t have minds of their own.”

“Is that what you thought of me at first?”

“Yes, it was. You were quick to prove me wrong, though.” He nudges Sans playfully. “You always are.”

“It’s my solemn duty. Anyway—” He pushes up onto his toes. “Can you teach me how to fight with them?”

“I suppose so—but you must be careful, Sans. Just as with any magic, if you misuse them, they’re very dangerous. First things first: sit down, close your eyes.”

Sans sits and closes his eyes.

“See through their eyes. They’re extensions of yourself, your magic. You are them, and they are you. Now…”

They spend the rest of the afternoon training. By the time they’re done, Papyrus seems to have warmed up to the blasters. Sans even coaxes him into playing tag with them, once or twice. He’s so enraptured by this new use of his magic that he doesn’t notice the smoke blowing across town—not until Dad does.

“What’s that?” Dad lifts his head, sniffing the air. “Something’s burning.”

“Uuuh—” Sans clambers onto one of his blasters, floating upwards with it until he can see over the house. In the distant, over the forest, there’s a cloud of smoke. “It’s in the forest, whatever it is. Should we tell the Guard?”

“Yes, I think so. Stay here.”

“Wait—”

Dad glances expectantly at him.

“Can I go with you? Can  _ we  _ go with you?”

“Sans—”

“If it’s dangerous, I’ll bring Papyrus right back, I  _ promise,  _ and it’s not like Jackson’s. It won’t bring up any bad memories. Just—please? This time, can I go with you?” He points at his blasters. “I can take care of myself.”

Dad sighs softly. “Very well—but you must  _ listen  _ to me. If I tell you to go back to the house, you don’t question it, you turn around and go back right away. Understood?”

Sans nods eagerly, already scrambling up Dad’s hind leg and onto his back. Papyrus follows him up, grumbling. Dad takes off, leaping onto the house’s roof and then down into the street. He skids to a stop next to Doggo’s guard station, snuffling anxiously at the air as the smoke grows thicker.

“The forest,” Dad says, “what’s happening?”

“A fire. We aren’t sure what started it, but it’s spreading towards the Ruins and not towards town. It should be alright. The Dogi are keeping an eye on it,” Doggo says. 

“Towards the Ruins?” Dad lifts his head. Sans holds a hand out. The wind blows through his palm—and right towards town. “That’s odd, isn’t it? The wind should be driving it the other way.”

“Uh—Dad?”

“Yes, Sans?”

“Could it be, you know—” Sans squirms. An idea has taken root in his chest, and with it, guilt. “Because he doesn’t want to come any closer to town?”

Dad falls quiet. “You don’t think…”

“I mean. I mean, it would make sense. He’s...really upset about what happened, even if he hasn’t really talked about it yet.”

“But why now, after so long? He’s been doing fine. He should have told me if he felt that badly.”

“Maybe something just—happened.” Like Sans handing him a file full of descriptive details of torture. Yeah. Maybe like that. “Maybe he couldn’t hide it anymore. Either way, we need to go talk to him.”

“Yes, you’re right.” Dad drops his head back down to Doggo’s level. “It may be Grillby. We’ll go and speak with him. He won’t hurt anyone, so you can rest easy.”

“Well, if you say so,” Doggo says, crunching a dog treat in half. “Be careful, doc—and you too, pups.”

Sans flashes him a thumbs-up, and then Dad takes off, bounding deeper into the forest. The smoke swells and darkens around them, and Sans coughs. He decides breathing is too much trouble and stops. Papyrus whines, pressing closer to him and digging his claws into Sans’ legs. “It’s alright,” Sans says, rubbing his back. “It’s just Grillbz.”

They skid to a stop at the far edges of the fire. The snow has melted and refrozen as the fire drifted towards the Ruins; several trees still smolder around them. Dad paces forward, his claws sinking through the glassy snow in a desperate to keep his balance on the slick surface. He steps over narrow tendrils of fire, trying to find the bulk of it.

“There,” Sans says, pointing. Over to the side, through the trees, looms a wall of blistering red flame. The center of it blazes white and fierce; it’s hot enough there, Sans bets, to crack bone. He swallows and holds Papyrus protectively to his chest. Dad bounds forward, skidding to a stop before the fire. He manifests a pair of hands in front of himself to sign.

“Grillby!” he shouts. “Hey, Grillby! Do we have a problem?”

The fire roars, creeping to flank them. Sans twists around as the fire begins to close behind them, but Dad makes no move to escape. 

“I’m gonna take that as a yes,” Dad says. He raises his voice to be heard over the fire, although it does no good for Grillby. Sans is grateful for it, however—he leans forward, straining to hear. “Do you wanna calm down? Maybe? Please? We can talk about this, but destroying the forest isn’t going to make you feel any better.”

The fire looms over them, jumping between the treetops. A pair of hands blazes in front of Gaster.  _ YES,  _ they sign, sharp and vicious,  _ IT WILL. _

The flames lap around them, close enough to touch. Sans reaches out, and fire curls around his hand—warm, harmless. Grillby won’t hurt him. He lets out a breath, relieved. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs quietly to the fire, signing close to his chest. “I know what you’re angry about. It was the files, right? They were awful.”

The fire blazes higher, hotter. The heat of it presses against him, sets the air shimmering, but never once does it sting him. 

“Grillby, come on,” Dad pleads. “Don’t be angry. It’s not worth it. It—”

_ NOT WORTH IT?! OF COURSE IT’S WORTH IT! HOW YOU WERE HURT—HOW SANS AND PAPYRUS WERE HURT— _ The fire sputters with rage, and several tree trunks pop under the heat, sending splinters flying. Sans winces and covers Papyrus’ head with his hands.  _ THERE IS NOTHING MORE WORTH THIS ANGER, AND I WILL NOT WATER IT DOWN. IT DESERVES TO BE FELT. _

“I—I—” Dad opens his mouth. Closes it. He seems to be at a loss for words.

_ I AM ALLOWED,  _ Grillby signs viciously,  _ TO FEEL ANGRY, WINGS. _

“Of course you are, dear,” Dad says, stepping into the fire. It parts around him. “But not like this. This is—”

_ WHAT’S WRONG WITH THIS? I’M NOT HURTING ANYONE. A LITTLE BURN IS GOOD FOR THE FOREST. _

“Please,” Dad whispers. “Please, you’re scaring the children.

_ IT ISN’T THE CHILDREN I’M FRIGHTENING, IS IT? _

Dad flinches in shame. The fire wilts. A portion of it breaks away and begins to pull itself back into a humanoid form. Grillby stumbles to a stop in front of him.  _ I’m sorry,  _ he signs, first.  _ That was out of line. I shouldn’t be cruel to you—you’re hardly the source of my anger.  _ He reaches up, and Dad leans his head down to allow Grillby’s hand to rest on his muzzle.  _ Sans, Papyrus, Wings. I don’t mean to scare any of you. But I meant what I said—I’m not hurting anyone right now, and I refuse to bottle up my anger. I have to express it. This is a safe way to do that, is it not? A controlled burn. _

“Well, I—I suppose,” Dad admits. “I only wish you weren’t so angry.”

_ So do I, but there’s nothing we can do about that, now, unless we’re to turn back Time. _

“No. No, I don’t think that’s something we should mess with.”

Grillby side-eyes him.  _ It was...not meant to be an actual suggestion. Can you  _ do  _ that? _

“Er, no?” Dad shuffles his paws. “Not, you know. Easily. Or without a machine. Theoretically, it could be done, but—that’s hardly the point, we’re getting off-topic.”

_ I think time travel is a worthwhile change of topic. _

“Forget the time travel, forget it—the point  _ is,  _ I’m sorry you’re angry.”

_ As am I, but it’s nothing to fear.  _ Grillby rubs his thumbs gently along the sides of Dad’s muzzle, and Dad sighs softly and closes his eyes for a moment.  _ Anger is not always something harmful, old boy. I’m going to teach you that, one of these days. _

Dad smiles, grim and cynical. “You’re free to try.”

“Grillby?” Sans says.

_ Yes, little one? _

“I’m sorry you’re angry, too.”

_ That’s alright. It will fade. I’m just helping it on the way out— _ He stretches his arms, cracking his fingers.  _ So if you’ll excuse me, I’ve a burn to get back to. Tell the Guard I won’t go anywhere near town or the Ruins. I know what the forest can handle. _

“Alright.” Dad still looks uncomfortable, but he nudges Grillby affectionately. “Behave. See you for dinner?”

“Yeah! Be there or be square, old man,” Sans says. 

_ Well, I’d hate to be square. I’ll see you all there. _

Dad bounds back out of the forest, and the fire crackles warmly behind them. As they leave the shelter of the trees, however, they hear it begin to roar again. Sans wonders if Dad would be able to get rid of his anger, doing something like that. He wonders if Dad would settle down, after he’d hurt something that was okay to hurt—like trees, or rocks, or Jackson.

He wonders, and although he doesn’t know it, his father hopes for that very thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: grillby was a spicy little lad when he was younger—he got very angry very quickly about very many things. fortunately, he’s learned to manage his anger over the years, and he’s pretty mild-mannered now! but he has a healthy respect for his emotions, no matter what they are, and he’s not one to bottle things up. (er, well. most things. his crush on one particular skeleton, however, has been bottled for a while.)


	26. a fresh bruise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: surgeries, medical procedures, flashback, gaster’s terrible coping skills, brief self-harm

The day after Grillby’s burn, Dogaressa arrives at their front door. “Dr. Gaster?”

“Yes?” Dad crouches in front of the door, and Sans stays on the couch and hugs Papyrus tightly to his chest. He knows what this is about, and he already dreads it. Papyrus squirms and whines until he lets go. “What is it?”

“I received some important information from the Judge today.”

Dad sits up, backing away from the door. “Please, come in. Do we have a Judgement date yet? Has she finished speaking with the jury?”

“No, nothing like that. It’s, ah—” She winces, and Sans huddles down into himself. “I’m sorry, but it’s about Sans. The Judge says that a few days ago, when you were giving your statement, he broke into the evidence locker and stole several important files.”

For a moment, Dad is utterly, completely silent. Then, “...Sans?”

The uncertainty in his voice is heartbreaking. Sans slinks around the couch, hugging himself. “Mm-hm?”

“That’s not true, is it?” Dad asks. He’s practically pleading. “You wouldn’t have done that. You would have told me if you’d done that. It was someone else.”

Sans swallows hard. His dad will fight for his innocence, if Sans lies. His dad will believe him. His dad  _ trusts  _ him, and Sans has repeatedly ground that trust into dust. “No,” he says quietly. “It was me. But it was for a good reason, it was—”

Dad’s claws twitch, scraping against the carpet. “Bring the files here.” His voice is flat, now. “Return them to Dogaressa so she can take them back to the Judge, where they belong.”

“I gave them to Alphys,” he admits, barely above a whisper. 

A shudder rolls through Dad’s bones, rattling his joints briefly. 

“I’ll go check there,” Dogaressa says immediately. “It’s really no problem.”

“If you don’t find them, please come back here at once and let me know. I’ll help you look for them. Those files are dangerous, and they shouldn’t be in the wrong hands.”

“Yes, of course. I’ll call you as soon as I find them, and if I don’t, I’ll come right back here. Thank you, Dr. Gaster.” Dogaressa ducks out of the house, closing the door behind her. Sans wishes dearly she would have taken him along. Instead, he’s left to cower behind his father, guilt lashing beneath his ribs. 

Dad turns to face him, and Papyrus steps between them. 

“Sans. Take your brother and go to Grillby’s, please.”

That is...not what he was expecting. “To Grillby’s?”

“Yes. That’s what I said.” Dad lowers his head. A faint gleam of deep purple surrounds each darkening eyelight—the color of a fresh bruise, dark and sore. “Hurry up.”

“Where are you—”

Dad snaps his jaws, his eyelights mere pinpricks. The sounds that come from him then aren’t Wingdings—aren’t even Common at all. It’s a bestial language that Sans only recognizes by instinct; it’s the language of wolves and dragons and wild things. It has no words, only intent, and the intent behind Dad’s noises are clear:  _ get away from me. _

Sans’ reaction is equally instinctive—he quails, shrinking back and dropping his eyes. If he had had a tail in this form (or in either form), he would’ve tucked it. Papyrus, on the other hand, bristles up and responds in kind. He clacks his teeth, snarls viciously. There’s a different tone to his threat; not a  _ get away from me  _ but a  _ get away from what belongs to me. _

Sans supposes that means him.

He reaches down and snatches Papyrus up, stumbling away from Dad. Dad draws back and takes a deep, shuddering breath, squeezing his eyes shut. Sans inches past him and bolts through the door. He skids into Grillby’s, panting, and the elemental blinks at him.  _ Sans? _

Sans’ lower job wobbles. He takes a breath. He has to be stronger than this. He can’t scare Papyrus. “...can I talk to you?” he says, setting Papyrus down so he can sign along. He’s proud when his voice only cracks a  _ tiny  _ bit.

_ Of course. Come here. _

Sans follows Grillby into the back room, Papyrus on his heels. His brother refuses to leave him, even to hide—instead, he stands between Sans and Grillby, his razor-sharp spines still half-lifted in warning. Sans leans against the wall, rubbing his face. He’s cool. He’s calm. He’s got this. He’s a big brother now,  _ he’s got this. _

_ What’s wrong?  _ Grillby asks, kneeling in front of him.  _ Sans? _

“It’s Dad,” Sans whispers, guilt swamping him. God, he’s going to make Dad feel worse. What if his soul starts to rot again? What if he never forgives Sans? He’s already betrayed Dad’s trust enough, hasn’t he? 

_ What about him?  _ Grillby tenses, alarmed yellow streaking his flames.  _ Is he well? Where is he? _

“He’s—yeah, he’s fine. He’s at the house. Or, um. He was a few minutes ago.”

_ Why would he have left? _

Because it’s what he does. Because he runs when he’s scared. Because the knowledge of how to flee is one of the only gifts his own father ever gave him. Sans bites back on the words. “...I dunno. It’s—I don’t know. I think he just needed some space. He sent Pap and me over here.”

_ He sent you away? All alone? _

“Well, not alone.” Sans crouches, setting a hand on Paps’ skull. “With each other.”

_ You know what I mean. He doesn’t like you running around without adult supervision, and it’s no wonder. _

“Hey, I resent that implication,” Sans says, trying for a lighthearted tone. Grillby doesn’t react to it, so he slumps again. Papyrus leans against his legs. “Anyway, he was...kind of upset. He found out about the files.”

Grillby crackles dark, furious red. The heat around him increases considerably, and Sans winces. The air cools. 

_ Sickening, that shit. Science!  _ Grillby makes a spitting, crackling noise of rage.  _ Oh, what a clever way to dress up  _ torture.  _ Your father has every right to be upset; you knew he would be, didn’t you? _

“Yeah, but—” Sans glances away.

_ What? _

“Nah, it’s nothing.”

_ No, Sans, talk to me.  _ Grillby reaches out, setting a hand on his shoulder. Papyrus growls nervously, and Grillby kneels to their level.  _ I’m here. For both of you. Scratch that, for all three of you. Tell me what’s wrong, please. Let me help. _

Sans swallows hard. “Dad’s...really angry.”

_ I know. He’s been angry for a while, hasn’t he? _

Sans nods miserably. “Ever since Jackson. But he won’t—he won’t admit it. He won’t deal with it. He just holds it all in and then blows up. And he’s scared, too. Alphys says he should be able to change back whenever he wants to, but that he doesn’t really want to because he’s so afraid of how it feels.”

_ Well, I can’t blame him for being afraid. From what I’ve seen— _ Grillby flickers grimly, dark and smokey red.  _ It was a traumatic transformation. As for his anger—well, your father’s not one to get angry easily. In fact, I don’t think I’ve  _ ever  _ seen him truly angry before, and I’ve known him a long while. I doubt he has any idea how to cope with what he’s feeling. _

“So what do I do?” Sans asks, spreading his hands helplessly. “I want to help him, but I don’t know how. I’m trying to be good, I’m trying to fix things, but it feels like I just keep messing up and upsetting him even more.”

_ You’re five, Sans. It’s not your responsibility to help him. That’s what his friends and therapist are for. Your job is to be his son, and in that, you cannot fail. Here, I’ll tell you what I’ll do: I’ll go and speak with him right now. I’ll tell him that you’re concerned—that we’re all concerned—and I’ll try to help him figure some things out. How does that sound? _

“Good, but—but—” Sans clicks his teeth together nervously. “I don’t want him to hurt you. He’s really angry right now. Maybe you should wait until he calms down?”

Gaster sits back on his heels, his face grave.  _ You really think that he’s angry enough to hurt me? _

“No! No, Dad would never—he’d never hurt you, or anybody. But, um.” Sans swallows. “Better safe than sorry…?”

_ Sans... _

“I don’t think he’d hurt you, but I don’t—he’s not exactly normal right now, you know? And I just—I want him to be normal again.” His eyes sting, and he sniffles furiously. Papyrus nudges his hands. “I know it’s stupid, and selfish, but I just want him to go back to normal. I don’t want him to be a blaster anymore. I don’t want him to be sad and mean and angry anymore. I want my dad back!”

_ Oh, little one— _ Grillby reaches out, drawing Sans into his arms. Sans hugs him tightly, burying his face against the collar of Grillby’s shirt. He rocks Sans gently, rubbing his back, and Sans clings and trembles and try valiantly not to cry.

“I want him back,” he mumbles, wretched. “I want Dad back. I miss him so much, Grillbz. I thought when we came home things would be okay again, but they’re not, and I just—I’m so tired.”

_ I know. I know it’s hard. I know you only want everything to be alright again, but I’m afraid it’s not that simple. What you’ve all been through is going to take time to cope with. What your father has been through, it isn’t going to go away. In time, these bad feelings will lessen, and he will grow happier, but this is a wound that will scar. Right now, he needs your patience more than ever. _

“I know. I’ve been trying to be good for him, but I just keep messing up. He won’t listen to me anymore. It’s like I can’t talk to him about anything, because he just gets sad or scared or angry. I made him happy, yesterday. Heh.” Sans wipes his eyes. “First time in forever, felt like.”

_ How’d you do that? _

“I made a blaster. He was—he said he was proud.”

_ And I’m sure he was. Your father is always proud of you, Sans, and he always loves you. He’s just having trouble showing it right now. Trauma does terrible things to a person, as you well know. I’m sure you’re having troubles of your own. What’s important is that you all communicate, and you remember that you love each other, alright?  _ Grillby tweaks his nose.  _ Don’t go giving up on me, now. Things will be okay, you’ll see. _

Sans takes a deep breath. “Yeah. I just...wish it wouldn’t take so long.”

_ I know. I’m sorry, Sans.  _ Grillby clasps his shoulders.  _ Look, I’ll go talk with your dad right now, and we’ll see if we can work something out. I’m sure he doesn’t want to make you feel this way. You two stay here—I’ll be right back, once your father has calmed down. If you’re hungry, help yourselves to the snacks in the fridge. _

Sans scoops Papyrus up again, and together, the two of them watch as Grillby heads out the door and into the snow—one tiny speck of warmth against a world of cold, searing white. 

* * *

Gaster sits in the snow, panting hard. One hind paw scratches furiously at the collar around his throat. Thick gray magic clogs between his claws, splatters against the ground. His chest feels scraped raw with absolute fury—and with terror. Why the hell would Sans have stolen those files and then  _ lied  _ about it for days? Why doesn’t his own son trust him? Is Gaster really that changed?

...is he really that awful, now?

He bares his teeth, staggering to his feet. The trees arch around him, the skeleton of a forest that stretches for miles. He presses his head to one of the trunks, pushes pushes  _ pushes  _ until he hears it creak. He wants to keep pushing. Instead, he draws back, hissing in dissatisfaction. Behind him, he hears the sizzle of snow beneath warm feet. His head snaps around, bones rattling.

“Grillby,” he says. His voice is cold. He manifests a pair of hands to sign along, heedless, for once, of the magic it wastes. “What are you doing here?”

_ You look like shit. _

Gaster’s tail lashes. “You’re supposed to be watching the boys.” 

_ I’m not your hire, Wings, and you’d do well to remember it. _

“They could be hurt—”

_ You’re the one hurting them, right now. _

A snarl echoes between Gaster’s ribs, and he leans forward, looming over Grillby. “I would never hurt them,” he says, his voice warped. He doesn’t recognize it, and he loathes himself for it. “Never. How dare you even  _ insinuate—” _

_ Do you really believe that? Because I don’t think you do. You sent them to me because you were afraid you’d hurt them. You keep smothering this anger because you’re afraid of feeling it! _

“Of course I’m afraid—look at me! Look at what he did to me, look at what he turned me into.” He snaps his jaws, bristles his spines. “I’m ugly and broken and  _ evil.” _

_ You are none of that,  _ Grillby snaps.  _ Don’t say such things about yourself. _

“You must be blind as well as deaf, if you can’t see me for what I am now.”

_ I know you have a cruel streak.  _ Grillby’s flames flicker bitter blue.  _ I’ve been made well aware of it, but that does not make you  _ evil.  _ You have never in your life been evil. You are, above all, kind and gentle and— _

“Yes, yes, the Judge already gave me a run-down of all my character traits. It doesn’t matter. I’m never going to be normal again. I’m never going to be safe again.”

_ That’s not true. _

“What would you know about it?”

_ Sans told me that he took the files for Alphys so they could figure out how to change you back. _

Gaster goes very, very still.

_ I spoke to Alphys before I came to find you— _ she’s  _ watching your kids, by the way. I wouldn’t leave them alone for so long. I’m not stupid. When I saw that you’d left the house, I called her over. She says you ought to be able to transform whenever you want. That ability isn’t something Jackson took from you—the will was. _

“When?”

_ What? _

“When did Sans tell you he took the files?”

_ Ah—Wings.  _ Grillby rubs his forehead, evidently frustrated. Well, he’s not the only one.  _ A couple of days ago, okay?  _

“And you didn’t tell me.”

_ He knew you would react this way _

“What way? What way?!” Gaster rakes his claws through the snow. “This way?! He knew I would be  _ upset  _ that he went behind my back, put himself  _ and  _ his brother in danger,  _ traumatized  _ himself looking at those files, stole valuable evidence from the court, and then  _ lied  _ about it to my face? No! Why the fuck would I be  _ upset?  _ You’re right, I should just let him get away with it. Maybe I should go congratulate him on being able to outsmart me at every  _ fucking turn—” _

_ This isn’t merely upset, Wings. You’re angry. You’re angrier than you should be and you know it. That’s why you left—you were afraid you’d hurt someone. And since that’s the case, this truly has gone too far. _

“No  _ shit,”  _ Gaster says, pacing across the snow. “I’m tired of feeling this way. I didn’t ask for this.”

_ But you got it, and now you’re angry, and that’s  _ okay.  _ You’re allowed to be angry. You’re allowed to feel this way. What Jackson did to you, it was— _ Grillby falters.  _ I saw. The files.  _

Gaster’s soul curdles with shame—how weak Grillby must think him, now. “Of course you did.”

Grillby waves his hands in a placating motion.  _ But we don’t need to focus on that right now. Let’s focus on what happened to you and how it makes you feel. _

“When are we not?” Gaster asks bitterly. “That’s all I think about anymore. That’s all anybody thinks about. Even if they don’t say it, the way they look at me—as long as I’m in this damned form, they’ll never see me for  _ me.” _

_ I know it must be hard. I want you to be able to choose the form you feel most comfortable with, but right now—right now, you clearly aren’t ready for that. You need to focus on healing first.  _

He...doesn’t feel like that’s possible. “I don’t even know where to start.”

_ Okay, so first, whatever you’re feeling, just—stop suppressing it. You’re pretty bad at it anyway, and it’s only making things worse. If you feel angry, then  _ feel angry. 

“Yes, because that’s been working out so well for me,” he says grimly. He thinks on how he snapped at the boys, and his anger quails in the face of growing shame. “I  _ hurt  _ people when I’m angry.”

_ No, you hurt people because you hold everything you feel inside until you blow up. You hurt people because you have no idea how to regulate your emotions and handle yourself right now,  _ Grillby says, putting his hands on his hips.  _ You need better coping mechanisms. _

“Well I am  _ open  _ for suggestions, if you know so much about what I need.”

_Go to_ therapy! Grillby flails his arms. _For the_ love of god—

“I am going! Soon!”

_ Good! _

“Good!”

_Until then, stop being such a_ coward. _You do not have to be frightened of your anger. It is not a dangerous thing unless you allow it to be—_ you _are not a dangerous thing._ _You need to spend time with yourself, your_ emotions. _You need to let yourself feel, how to control yourself when you’re feeling. I know you’re strong enough to, I know you are—_

“...I can’t.”

_ Wings— _

“I have too many things to do,” Gaster says, practically pleading. “The boys’ therapy appointment,  _ my  _ therapy appointment, the surgeries, the statements, the Judgement date—I can’t afford to miss any of it. I’ll go to therapy, but that’s as much time as I can afford to waste on these fickle feelings. The boys need me with them, they need me to be strong and safe and  _ good,  _ not wallowing around feeling sorry for myself.”

_ The boys need you to be okay more than anything else right now. Sans is hurting, Wings. He’s afraid for you. _

“He needn’t be. I’m fine.”

_ No, you’re  _ not,  _ and it’s time you quit acting like it. _

“Then what would you have me act? Because if I acted how I felt—” He snaps his jaws together, hissing.  _ “It wouldn’t be very pretty.” _

_No, it wouldn’t._ _Trauma isn’t_ pretty, _Wings. Dealing with trauma isn’t fucking_ pretty. _It’s crying and screaming and shouting and burning chunks out of a forest, it’s hiding beneath the bed during thunderstorms because the vibrations feel like_ cannons, _it’s jumping whenever light glints the wrong way because it reminds you of swords, it’s gagging on the scent of goddamn_ bacon _for years because it reminds you of frying flesh!_

“Grillby—” Gaster’s soul wrenches, and he leans forward.

_ I’ve been there. I’ve done that. It isn’t pretty. It isn’t fun. It’s just something that has to be done—it’s  _ work.  _ And you know what?  _ Grillby spreads his arms.  _ It’s worth it. I am  _ happy,  _ Wings. I am okay. It took me decades to be able to say that, but here I am, and it was worth every goddamn second. I have Fuku. I have the bar, I have my home and my community and my friends and the boys. I have  _ you,  _ and everything is going to be okay.  _

Gaster pushes his muzzle to Grillby’s chest, his anger and shame—albeit momentarily—smothered by his pride for his friend. “I’m glad,” he whispers. “Well done.”

Grillby hugs his muzzle, warm hands stroking beneath his chin.  _ And that, my dear, is exactly what I’m going to be telling you in a few years’ time. Hell, I’ll tell you every day, if you want me to. You’re going to be okay. All of you. But this—this  _ cowardice,  _ Wings? It’s not going to work. You cannot run from your emotions. You cannot run from what happened. You know that. _

“...I know.”

_ Then why are you trying so hard? _

“The boys,” he whispers, sitting and curling his tail around his feet. “I don’t want them to see me like that. I’ve already been so cruel to them—”

_ Cruel? No. Unnecessarily harsh? Yes. Sans deserves anger, perhaps, but he deserves the anger of a loving parent—a loving parent who is  _ in control  _ of their emotions. He does not deserve to be snapped at. I know you know that, and I know you regret what you’ve done. I’m not here to scold you for it. I can be no harsher on you than you will be on yourself. What that boy needs from you isn’t regret—it’s your healing. He needs you to start getting better. Enough of this wallowing. Enough of this fear. You need to be brave now. _

Gaster swallows hard, squeezing his eyes shut. “I’m not very good at that.”

_ Then it is time to learn. You have done very brave things before, and I’m sure you will continue to do them. For starters, next time you’re angry, don’t ignore it.  _

“If I’m around people, though, I—I don’t want to be angry at  _ them.”  _ He only wants to be angry at  _ one person.  _ If he can cram all of his anger into that  _ one person  _ and then do away with it, well—he’ll feel better then, won’t he?

_ No, I understand. It isn’t good to take your anger out on others—why don’t you come here next time? _

“Here? The forest?”

_ Yes, precisely. And once you’re here, you can do whatever you need to do. Tear up trees, bash the rocks, burn the whole forest down—who cares? Just get the anger  _ out.  _ You can start working on managing your other emotions, too. Who knows? Maybe you’ll be ready for your next change sooner than you think. _

“Next change?”

_ If you’d like. I know this form is inconvenient for you—and not particularly healthy as far as magic goes, either. If Alphys is right and you can change back, I think you should try to—but only once you’re ready. If you try to force it, it’s only going to scare you more. Transforming is supposed to be a natural experience, isn’t it? And what Jackson did to you was absolutely unnatural and absolutely wrong. He ruined something that was supposed to be innate. It’s up to you to change how you feel about transforming, if that’s even something you want to do. _

“I want to talk to Alphys first. I want to see those files.”

_ By all means—although I do believe they’ve been returned to the Judge, by now. _

Gaster scoffs. “Alphys made copies. Come, now, she’s not stupid.”

_ I never meant to insinuate that she was.  _ He pats the side of Gaster’s muzzle gently.  _ Now, I’ll let you go this time, old boy—but next time you get angry, I want you to tell me. If nothing else, I can help keep you—and everyone else—safe, so you feel more comfortable, er, feeling. Deal? _

Gaster hesitates—it doesn’t sound safe. He knows he would be better off if he could control his emotions (and god, he wishes he could, he wishes so  _ much)  _ but he’s simply not sure he can. Everything feels very overwhelming, and very strong, and very sharp, and he is so broken and wretched and weak. “I—”

_ Please,  _ Grillby says.  _ Please. I can handle you.  _ Trust  _ me, Wings, and let me trust you. _

Gaster glances away, his soul twisting. Grillby’s trust is the last thing he deserves. He is going to drag that trust through hell and back, if Grillby gives it to him now. “You’d better not.”

_ Wings— _

“I’m serious, Grillby. I’m not—I don’t think I’m the person you think I am,” he says, glancing away. The snow gleams, bright and cold and unyielding. “At least not anymore.”

Grillby exhales, dark smoke curling around his mouth.  _ Then let me learn to know you as you are now, but we’ve nothing to gain by distrusting each other. _

“I’m only going to disappoint you. Trust me when I say that, if you trust anything.”

_ You will  _ not, Grillby says, folding his arms across his chest.  _ Let’s just  _ try.  _ What’s the harm in trying? _

“I could hurt you, I could—”

_ You won’t. You can’t bite me unless I let you, you fool creature.  _

“I can blast, I can—”

_ You won’t hurt me. I know you won’t.  _

Gaster’s head droops. “...your blind faith is what’s going to get you hurt, my friend. You don’t know what you’re setting yourself up for.”

_ Let’s just try—next time you’re angry, let me help. If it  _ doesn’t  _ help, we won’t ever do it again, but just one time, just once— _

“Stars, you’re worse than the Sans begging for dessert.” Gaster sighs heavily, rubbing a paw along the back of his skull. 

_ Is that a yes? _

“Well, it isn’t a no.”

Grillby sparks in delight, his eyes brightening.  _ Wonderful! I’ll expect to see you soon, then. _

“Oh, joy.” He sets his paw back down, wiping gray sludge off of it. “Now—”

_ You’re hurt. _

“Only a little. It’s the damned collar.”

_ Let me see. _

“Grillby—”

Grillby clambers up his foreleg to crouch on his shoulder, peering at the indentions in his bones. Out of the corner of his eye, Gaster sees him spark red with rage.  _ We need to clean these up, and  _ you  _ need to stop scratching at them.  _

“It’s not so easy.”

_ We’ll get you a shame cone. _

“A—a shame cone?”

_ Yes, you know. Cone of shame? You put it on dogs when—it’s a real thing! You remember when Dogaressa had her surgery a few years back, you remember— _

Gaster can’t help but laugh, nudging Grillby properly on his back for the ride home. “Alright, alright, I’ll do my best to quit. I don’t think my pride could handle the cone of shame. Oh, but Grillby, there’s just one more thing.”

Grillby cocks his head.  _ Yes? _

Gaster angles his good eye back at Grillby. “Next time you go behind my back and help my son with such dangerous plans, I’ll not be so easy on you. Don’t do it again.”

_ Ah.  _ Guilt flickers across his face.  _ No, I won’t. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that, but I—have to admit, I was curious as to what Alphys would say, too. _

“Why didn’t you simply speak with me about it? Why did you have to go behind my back?”

_ I—ah, Wings. It wasn’t a well-considered decision. I suppose it was because—it was because I didn’t want you to be upset if the news was bad, either. I don’t like it when you’re upset, but I see now that there’s no way you  _ aren’t  _ going to be upset. You’re simply going to have to learn to cope with it. Rather than protect you from it, perhaps I can help you learn to manage it. _

“Hm. Well, I appreciate the thought, if not the actions you took.”

Grillby sighs in relief.  _ I’ll be sure to be upfront with you from now on, if you’ll do the same for me. _

“I’ll...try,” Gaster says, although he knows he won’t be able to hold to that promise, not quite. “Thank you, Grillby. Really. You’re one of the best friends I have, and I’m lucky to have you. I love you. You know that, right?”

Grillby is...very pink, all of a sudden. “Uh-huh.”

“Good. Now, let’s be going. I need to have a long talk with Sans.”

_ Yes, you do. You owe him quite an apology—oh, and for what it’s worth, I love you too. _

Gaster purrs softly, heading for town. “Glad to hear it. Are we still on for dinner tonight?”

_ Aren’t we always, my dear? _

It’s sweet, Gaster thinks, Grillby’s faith in him—Grillby’s utter conviction that he is not a dangerous thing. Perhaps he’s even right. Perhaps Gaster  _ isn’t  _ a dangerous thing, as long as he can figure out a way to control himself, as long as he can keep himself from laying tooth or claw on any other creature. 

...it’s just too bad that in one particular instance, he doesn’t actually  _ want  _ to.

Grillby is going to be so terribly disappointed.

* * *

“Sans?” Gaster sticks his head into Grillby’s back room. Sans sprawls out on the floor, solving a crossword puzzle while Papyrus sniffs out the area. Both of their heads snap around when they hear his voice. “Hey, boys. You ready to go home?”

“Uh—” Sans’ eyes flicker uncertainly to Grillby, then back to him. “Yeah. C’mon, Paps.”

Gaster leads the way home, his boys walking quietly behind him—too quietly. It makes his soul ache, to think that he’s scared them so. He slips into the house, ushering Sans and Papyrus in after him before shutting the door. Sans stands in the middle of the living room, shuffling his feet. Papyrus stands defensively in front of him. 

“I’m sorry,” is the first thing Gaster says. Sans’ head jerks up, his eyes wide. “I know I’ve said it before, and I’ll probably say it again, but I’m sorry. I keep getting angry at you, and you don’t deserve it. Please don’t ever think you deserve it.”

“But I—I do,” Sans says. “Don’t I? I mean, I stole the files—”

“Yes.” Gaster exhales quietly. “So you did. Allow me to correct myself: the  _ manner  _ in which I got angry at you was not okay. My anger was warranted. You knew I would be upset with you.”

Sans nods.

“So why did you do it?”

“I—I wanted to help.” Sans hugs himself, glancing away. “I wanted to help change you back to normal, because I know you’re not happy like this.”

“Why didn’t you simply talk to me about it?”

“You wouldn’t have let me look at those files.”

“No, but I would have let Alphys.”

Sans falls silent, hugging himself more tightly.

“You don’t need to go behind my back, little one,” Gaster says. “Enough of that. Just  _ talk  _ to me. What are you so afraid of? Have I done something to make you think I’m unreasonable?”

Sans shakes his head. “No, but I just—I thought you might get sad if Alphys told you you couldn’t change back, or—or that you might get angry.”

“Ah.” Gaster winces, although it’s an accusation well-deserved. “That’s...fair. I have been getting upset more often than usual. How about this—if you try to talk to me when you want to do something, I’ll try to keep myself from getting so upset around you anymore. I spoke with Grillby, and we’ve worked out a plan. If I ever start to feel in a bad sort of way, I’m going to go away for a little while to calm down—but I  _ will  _ be back. I won’t abandon you again. Is that fair?”

Sans pauses, mulling it over, and then nods. “Yeah. I think so. Are you—is Grillby gonna help you not be angry anymore?”

“Kind of,” Gaster says, laying down and folding his paws in front of him. “I’m going to be working very hard on not having anymore outbursts. The therapist—and Grillby—will be helping me with that. Most of the work I need to do on myself will have to wait until after our surgeries and the Judgement, though. There’s simply no time for it.”

Sans frowns. “I think taking care of yourself is more important than all that.”

“Maybe,” Gaster allows, “but it won’t be too long now.”

“Okay.” Sans moves to sit down next to him, leaning tentatively against his side. Gaster chirrs softly, and Sans relaxes. “I’m—still really sorry, though. About taking those files. I promise I’ll try to just talk to you from now on, instead of doing stuff by myself.”

“I would appreciate that very much.”

“It feels like we’ve had this conversation before.”

“And we’ll probably have it again. As frustrating as it can be, time is what we need most,” Gaster says. “But we’ll still have to work very hard from now on. Undoubtedly, we’ll make mistakes and have to try again, but we’ll get better. I know it. I’ll forgive any mistakes you make, Sans. Never think otherwise.”

“And I’ll forgive yours,” Sans says, setting his jaw. “You’re my dad, and I love you.”

Gaster’s eyes sting, and he curls up around Sans. “Thank you, my little one. I love you too—no matter what. However, mistakes do need to be rectified. Tomorrow, I’m going to take you back to the Hall, and you’re going to apologize to the Judge.”

“Would it be weird if I told you she let me take the files?”

“She  _ what?!” _

After a hasty explanation, Gaster sits back, fuming—but this time, at the Judge. “I can’t believe her,” he says, affronted. “Giving information like that to a  _ child.  _ Some good judgement she has!”

“Well, I  _ did  _ kind of threaten her.”

“Oh, forgive me, Sans, but you’re not the sort of person who’s an actual threat to a Judge.”

Sans gives him a look full of offense.

“Of course you’re still very threatening,” Gaster hastens to assure him. “Very ominous and powerful.”

“Don’t patronize me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. But, oh, you just  _ see  _ what I have to say to her tomorrow—you just  _ see!”  _

Sans pats his shoulder consolingly. 

That night, as he rests at home after a hearty meal at Grillby’s, watching his children play, he decides that—yes. Yes, this is worth fighting for. It’s worth working for. It’s worth every second for the next thousand years, if that’s what it takes. He’s going to be okay again. They’re  _ all  _ going to be okay again. 

His happiness will persevere.

* * *

“—cannot  _ believe  _ you! He’s  _ five.  _ Why on earth would you show him—”

“I didn’t show him anything he hadn’t already seen when he was rummaging around in the evidence locker,” the Judge points out, offering him a disgruntled look. “I merely let him follow his own foolish plans. You were a better teacher than I as to the consequences of such plans.”

“You knew I would be furious.”

“And you both learned an important lesson, didn’t you?” She sniffs haughtily. “You’re welcome.”

“You used me.”

“Don’t blame me for your own mistakes, Dr. Gaster, nor your son’s.”

_ “You  _ are the adult here,” he hisses, snaking his head forward. “You were supposed to be responsible. You were supposed to look out for his wellbeing, not encourage him to fail so he learned a fucking  _ lesson.” _

She mantles her wings, her eyes narrowing sharply. “Don’t take that tone with me.”

“Then do not insinuate that you were in the right! Would you let him jump off of a cliff so he learns it hurts when his bones break?” Gaster makes a spitting sound of fury, beginning to pace. “Has your judgement always been this flawed?”

“I needed to test him.”

“What the hell could you  _ possibly—” _

“He is a Judge.”

Gaster freezes. 

“There, you see?” She relaxes her wings, folding them neatly against her back. “I have my reasons. He’s no ordinary child. I needed to see where his own judgement abilities were. This was a relatively safe, convenient way to do so. As a Judge, he’ll be expected to—”

“Don’t say that.” His spines begin to bristle, and his claws curl into the golden tile beneath him. “He is no Judge. He is a child.”

“A child who will grow up to become one of the most powerful monsters in the Underground.”

“He will  _ never  _ be powerful,” Gaster hisses. “He has no  _ magic.” _

“Magic enough to make a fleet of blasters.”

“Ones that will last half an hour, at most! He is and will never be strong enough to kill another monster, nor will you—or anyone else—ask such a damnable thing of him. You do not come near him, do you understand me? He will have nothing to do with you. He _will not be a Judge.”_

“That is not yours to determine. You—”

“I am his  _ father.”  _ Gaster arches his neck, baring his teeth. “Until he is of age, he is under my care and protection, and  _ I  _ will decide how best to raise him. You are not to have anything to do with him. I will not allow it, and if you will not listen to me, I will see to it that our king commands as much.”

The Judge sighs, inclining her head. “...you won’t be able to protect him forever, you know.”

“I know it well,” he says grimly, “but I will protect him while I can. He deserves what childhood he has left. Leave him to it.”

“Very well.” She straightens, although there’s a distinctly unsatisfied look in her eyes. “In the meantime, I suppose you’d like to look at those files your son had.”

For almost an hour, Gaster sits in the Judgement Hall and reads over the files—well, as best he can read them while coming to terms with the fact his son is a Judge (the thought makes something low and unpleasant curdle in his soul). He comes to the same conclusion Alphys had—physically, he should be able to change. Mentally, however? Emotionally? 

He wonders if he hasn’t lost the ability permanently.

Still, the thought of returning to his regular form some day gives him hope. He returns the files, takes a deep breath, and steps away again. His children are with Asgore when he returns, and he chirrs his approval, nuzzling all three of them—his family, his precious family. Their next stop is Alphys’. 

He does not spare her his wrath, either.

“What were you thinking?” he demands, his tail lashing. She cringes in front of him, her cheeks flushed with shame. “He’s  _ five,  _ Alphys. He’s not old enough to make decisions like that, and you shouldn’t be enabling him. He doesn’t need to be sneaking around behind my back, and here you are,  _ helping him.” _

“I—I’m so s-sorry, Dr. Gaster.”

“As you well should be. How can I blame him for things like this when the adults in his life are the ones teaching it to him? Now, I know part of it’s my fault, but you’re not innocent, either. I’ll tell you what I told him—if you’ve a problem, _talk_ to me about it. Don’t go around trying to solve problems on your own. If you can’t manage that, then you don’t need to be around him.”

Alphys’ breath hitches.

“I don’t  _ want  _ to keep you out of his life,” he admits, sitting down. “He loves you, as I do. And I know you love him, and you want what’s best for him, but—but you have to  _ think  _ about these things. Going around behind people’s backs, it isn’t okay. I know he’s clever for his age, but he’s still impressionable. If he sees you doing these things, if you  _ help  _ him do these things, then he’s going to think they’re acceptable. Do you understand?”

“Y-yes, sir.”

“I want to trust you. So do me a favor—bring me the copies you made of those files.”

Alphys hesitates, and for a moment, Gaster fears she’s going to deny having made copies—then she wilts, and she scurries into her work lab. She returns a moment later, a file tucked under her arm. She hands it to him. 

“Thank you,” Gaster says, taking the files gingerly between his teeth. He pads towards the door, squeezing through it. He grimaces as he feels Hotland’s dust beneath his claws, and his children—who had been playing marbles with two of the Guards—glance over at him. “Sans, let’s practice a little more. Summon a blaster, please.”

Sans summons a blaster. It watches Gaster earnestly.

“Ready, aim—” Gaster tosses the file into the air. “—fire.”

Magic hums and whines, and then the blaster’s jaws fly wide. A pulse of white energy surges forward, but it’s a tad too low. Sans makes a frustrated noise, and then a second blast bursts from the blaster’s jaws. This one smashes through the files and disintegrates them on contact mere seconds before they hit the ground. Sans pumps his fist victoriously. 

“Atta boy,” Gaster says, wagging his tail. He’d been worried about how Sans’ depth perception would be affected by his blind eye, but it appears to be something he can work around. That’s comforting. “Good correction.”

Papyrus clacks his teeth with distaste and turns back to swallowing the marbles. He seems to like it when they roll out of the back of his jaw.

“Was that all of them?” Sans asks.

Gaster glances at Alphys, who stops gawking and says, “Uh—y-yes, that’s all.”

“I’ll let you burn the rest of the files after the Judgement,” Gaster says, nudging Sans gently and crouching next to him. “For now, let’s go. We’re going to be late to your appointment.”

Sans scoops Papyrus up and hops onto Gaster’s back. They both say their goodbyes to Alphys and the Guards, then head into the capital. Gaster is glad for the paved streets, and he shakes the dust readily off of his paws. The children’s counseling center is near the outskirts of the capital; it’s a sturdy little building made of warm red brick. Gaster lets Sans and Papyrus off of his back when they reach it.

“Are you ready?” he asks.

Sans makes an uncertain sound, still holding Papyrus. “Eh. I guess.”

“It’ll be alright. It’s just talking—a conversation. You’re good at those.”

The three of them step inside. The foyer smells like cinnamon, and inspirational posters festoon the walls. The carpet is soft, plush beige. Sans and Papyrus take a seat in the chairs along the wall while Gaster crouches in front of the receptionist.

“Hello,” he says, as politely as he can. “I’ve an appointment for Sans and Papyrus Gaster.”

The receptionist rifles through his folders, then hands Gaster a clipboard with a stack of papers clipped to it. “Here you are,” he says cheerfully. “Just fill out these forms for me and we’ll get them right back to see Dr. Vanderpool. Will you need help writing?”

“No, no, I’ve got it—but thank you.”

He slinks back over to his children, curling up close to them—he still takes up most of the foyer. The other clients have to step over him, and he mutters sheepish apologies as he goes to work filling out the forms with a manifested hand (they’re getting easier to form, he’s pleased to notice). Once he’s finished, he returns the papers to the secretary, then tries valiantly to huddle close to the chairs. Sans uses him as footrest. 

A few moments later, a brisk little naga slithers into the room. “Sans and Papyrus?” she says, and Sans’ head jerks up. “Ah—that would be you two, wouldn’t it? Hi, there. I’m Dr. Vanderpool, and I’ll be your therapist.”

She moves across the room and offers them one scaly hand. Sans shakes it, and Gaster offers her a single talon to shake, too. “It’s nice to meet you,” Gaster says. “I’m Dr. Gaster, the boys’ father. This is my oldest, Sans, and my youngest, Papyrus.”

“Heya,” Sans says, waving. Papyrus peers warily at her from his spot underneath Sans’ chair, his eyelights ominous and bright in the shadows.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you all,” Dr. Vanderpool says. “To get started, how about we all step into my office? I just want to go over some specifics with you. Are you hungry? Thirsty? I’ve got snacks.”

“I could be convinced to snack,” Sans says, and Gaster snorts. The way to a skeleton’s soul, truly. 

The four of them crowd into Dr. Vanderpool’s office—it’s a tiny, cozy room, which Gaster is sure he would appreciate if he wasn’t the size of a small dragon. He loops himself around the entire room, setting his head on his tail. His back and shoulders protest the position, but he ruthlessly ignores them. Sans munches on a snack cake, feeding small pieces to Papyrus, who hides underneath the couch and grumbles under his breath. 

“Alright, so—Sans. How old are you, buddy?” Dr. Vanderpool asks, coiling up in an armchair with her notebook. 

“Five.”

“Five’s a big year, huh? Have you started kindergarten?”

“I did, but I’m not going anymore. Dad says I can start again next year.”

“Right.” She jots something down. “And how old is Mr. Papyrus?”

“He’s one,” Sans says, swinging his legs off of the couch.

“And how do you like being a big brother?”

A smile flickers across Sans’ face—one of the few smiles that reaches his eyes, anymore. “I like it a lot. Paps is the best.”

“I’m glad to hear it. He’s a cutie.” She waves at Papyrus, who shrinks farther beneath the couch. “Shy, isn’t he?”

“Mm-hm. Are you gonna help him not be?”

“Well, I’ll certainly try. So, Dr. Gaster—do you know how this works?”

“I’ve a vague idea.”

“Here’s the plan as of right now: we’ll have a quick half-hour meeting between the four of us, to see where things stand between you all as a family. After that, Dr. Gaster can pop back into the lobby, and I’ll meet with the boys separately for the last half-hour.”

“They’ll stay with each other, though? Papyrus—isn’t fond of being seperated from Sans.”

“Yes, they can stay together,” Dr. Vanderpool assures him. “At least until we’ve worked with Papyrus on his separation anxiety.”

Gaster nods. “Very well.”

“And do you know how this works, Sans?” Dr. Vanderpool asks.

“Mm—Dad says we talk about stuff, and you tell us how to feel better,” Sans says, shrugging.

“Well, I’ll give you advice on how to feel better, but it’s up to you to use that advice, and to let me know if something doesn’t work for you so we can come up with some more ideas. Does that sound fair?”

“Yep.”

“So—Sans, let’s hear from you first. Why are you here? What do you want to get out of this?”

Sans leans back into the couch, pulling his knees to his chest. “I’m here because of what happened with Jackson. I want Papyrus to start feeling better and be less scared. I want Dad to feel better, too.”

“And what about you?”

“I’m doin’ pretty okay, but I guess—I guess I wish the nightmares would go away.” He fiddles with his sleeves, pulling them down over his hands. “I wish I could stop thinking about what happened.”

Dr. Vanderpool nods, scrawling something down in her notebook. “Those are all very good reasons, Sans, and I’ll do my best to help you meet your goals. Now, you, Dr. Gaster. Why have you brought the boys here?”

“I want them to feel better,” Gaster says immediately. “I want them to develop the coping skills they need to deal with their trauma. I want them to be able to lead normal, healthy, happy lives.”

“Noble goals, doctor, and certainly attainable ones. Now, I’ve been briefed on what happened,” Dr. Vanderpool says, glancing up to meet his eyes, “but I’d like to hear the story from both of you. Sans, you first. Can you tell me what happened with Jackson?”

“Oh, jeez.” Sans rubs the back of his neck, glancing at the frosted window. “I don’t know all of the details.”

“That’s okay. Just tell me your side of the story. I’m sure Dr. Gaster can fill in the details in just a moment.”

“Right. Okay, so, um—I guess it was almost two months ago, now. I went to the lab with my dad...”

Gaster rests his head on his paws and closes his eyes, and he listens. He listens to his son’s story in full—not for the first time, but certainly for the first time since he’s been calm and settled and okay. He tries his best to integrate the details with the story in his own mind, to understand what his child has been through. Sans keeps himself removed from the story—even when he tells Dr. Vanderpool how he lost his tail, he keeps his shoulders relaxed and his voice nonchalant. Gaster wonders where he learned that sort of emotional suppression.

...hrm.

Dr. Vanderpool listens without interrupting, her hands folded in front of her. She makes sympathetic noises at all the right spots, and nods along without prompting, and for a moment, Gaster is jealous of her social ease—he’s quick to brush that off, though. If her social skills help her help his children, then there’s no bitterness to be felt about it. When Sans has finished, he jams his hands into his jacket pockets.

“So,” he says. “That’s that.”

“Thank you for telling me,” Dr. Vanderpool says. “What happened to you was awful, Sans.”

“Yep,” Sans agrees, studying his knees. “Could have been worse, though. What happened to Dad and Papyrus  _ was  _ worse.”

“And what happened to your dad and Papyrus?”

“You can ask him that.” Sans points at Gaster.

“I’d like to hear what  _ you  _ think happened—then your dad can have his turn, okay?”

So Sans tells them what  _ he  _ thinks happened, and Gaster is—surprised, how different Sans’ summary of events is from his own. The basic events are the same, but the emotions surrounding them and the occurrences that Sans fixates on are different. He gets caught up on the fact Gaster had been forced through a transformation, whereas Gaster himself is still caught up on the fact that  _ he thought his child was dead.  _ Sans talks, a twinge of irritation in his voice, about how Jackson treated him and Papyrus like animals. Gaster thinks that the fact he physically abused them is far more important, but Sans glazes over that part.

Odd, how different their stories are—not bad, no, but...odd. It’s good to realize. They lived different traumas, and they’ll cope with it in different ways. Gaster thinks that perhaps that’s the point Dr. Vanderpool is trying to make. When she turns to him, at last, he tells his story, and he sees the same surprise flicker across Sans’ face. It’s good, he thinks. This therapy thing. It might actually be good.

* * *

Gaster takes a deep breath, then steps into the operating room. The scent of anaesthetic unnerves him, as does the hum and whine of the machinery. Dr. Vanderpool had advised him about this, though she isn’t his personal therapist—he still has to meet that particular person, and soon. He just...didn’t want to meet them with a collar on.

He’s so  _ sick  _ of having a collar on.

“Good morning, Dr. Gaster,” Dr. Kervin says cheerfully, waving at him. She’s dressed in blue scrubs, her eyes bright. “You ready?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” Gaster says, shuffling his paws uncomfortably. 

“Nervous?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Well, don’t be.” She pats his shoulder, lowering the operating table. “It’ll be over before you know it. Lay your head right here for me.”

Gaster lays his head on the table. A chill rushes through his bones, and his claws grate against the floor. The nurse bustles around him, attaching wires, and he gulps and squeezes his eyes shut. It’s fine. It’s fine, it’s only a hospital, nothing bad is going to happen to him here. In. Out. In. Out. He’s alright. He’s...alright.

“How’re you doing, doc?” the nurse asks, his voice soft and soothing.

“‘m good,” Gaster mutters. He feels ill. “Ready to get this over with.”

“Only a few more minutes. You’re doing great.”

Dr. Kervin moves to stand next to his neck, running her hands along his cervical vertebrae. He hears a marker being uncapped, smells Sharpie fumes, and then feels her tracing out her cutting lines. His bones ache with the urge to rattle, but he forces himself to hold still. Happy thoughts, he’s thinking happy thoughts—he thinks of his children playing in the backyard, thinks of dinners at Grillby’s and tea at Asgore’s. 

It doesn’t help.

“Alright, bud,” Dr. Kervin says, touching the back of his skull gently. “I’m gonna numb you up now. Little poke, that’s all.”

He tenses, struggling to hold still as he feels the sting of a needle. The lidocaine burns as she pushes it through his bones, and he sucks in a sharp breath, his tail flicking. The last time someone had pushed needles through his bone—oh, what hell had followed. He squeezes his eyes shut. That’s not happening now. It’s not, it’s not, it’s  _ not. _

Dr. Kervin leaves him alone for several minutes after that, and he struggles to breathe and remember where he is. It’s incredibly tempting to simply leap up and bolt out of the room—but the knowledge that he  _ can  _ do that, should he need to, keeps him still and quiet. He can escape. He can tell them to stop, and they will. He’s going to be fine. He’s in control. If he can just remember that, then everything seems a little bit safer. 

“Alrighty. How are we feeling?” Dr. Kervin asks when she returns, touching his neck. “Quick poke—feel anything?”

“No,” Gaster murmurs, relieved. “Just pressure.”

“Awesome. I’m gonna disinfect you, and then we’ll start. Let me know if you need a break, or if anything hurts. I can always give you another shot.” She bustles around next to him with her nurses, carefully wiping disinfectant over the collar and the vertebrae it’s embedded in. After that, she picks up the bonesaw. Gaster takes a deep, shuddering breath.

He’s done this before. To Sans. To Papyrus. This is only justice.

He closes his eyes, holds very still, and lets the doctor saw through his bone. 

It’s painless. He’s as numb as could be—he only feels the jostling of the equipment, the deep pressure as his bones begin to shift and split. The saw whines sharply as it glances against the collar, and he flinches. Dr. Kervin sets a hand on his neck. “Easy, big guy. Got a blade right next to your neck, so let’s not be moving too much. I don’t wanna cut something I shouldn’t.”

Gaster mumbles his apologies, tucking his tail between his legs. 

Dr. Kervin moves to his other side, repeating the same process there. After a moment, she sets the saw aside, and silence washes over the room again. Gaster relaxes minutely—something warm and damp trickles down his vertebrae. Blood from his marrow, more than likely, if not infected magic. He swallows hard. Dr. Kervin’s hands come up to fiddle with the collar, unlatching the back before sliding it off of his neck. The weight of it vanishes, and that—

That is worth every moment of fear.

He cracks an eye open. “It’s gone?”

“Yep. All gone.” Dr. Kervin holds the collar up, showing it to him. It’s such a worthless thing, merely a band of metal streaked with rotten gray magic. He can’t believe _ that’s  _ what’s been causing him so much damned trouble. “I just gotta patch you up, now—gimme a few more minutes and then you can go celebrate, how’s that sound?”

Gaster laughs softly. “That sounds wonderful. That sounds really—really wonderful.”

He holds still as they clean his wound and file his bone back down, gluing the broken edges together. They wrap a thick white bandage over the wound, then secure his vertebrae with a splint. After that, Dr. Kervin steps back and beams at him. “Right. Here’s the deal: keep the bandage on for the rest of today. Change it tonight, and twice a day for the next two weeks. With any luck, your vertebrae will knit together again, but that’s gonna take time. Keep the splint on unless you’re cleaning the wound and changing bandages. The cracks don’t go all the way through the vertebrae, but if you’re too rough with them, they might deepen.”

“Got it,” Gaster says, lifting his head rather gingerly after that warning. 

“You’ll be numb for another couple of hours, but when you start hurting after that, pop some ibuprofen. If that’s not enough, come talk to me. For now, I’ll write you up a prescription for topical antibiotics—you’ll need to apply that each time you change the bandage to clear up that infection, and keep taking your oral antibiotics, too. If the infection gets any worse, or if it isn’t gone by the time your scrip runs out, come back here. Deal? Any questions?”

Gaster shakes his head. “No, ma’am. Thank you very much.”

“My pleasure.” She pats his shoulder, then heads for the door. “Take care of yourself, Dr. Gaster. I don’t want to see you back in my OR ever again.”

A smile flickers across his face, and he heaves himself to his feet and goes to retrieve his sweater. As soon as he’s out of the hospital and in the relative safety of the empty Waterfall caverns, he has an absolute breakdown. He curls up in an damp cave and shakes and shakes and  _ shakes  _ his way through the sound of the bonesaw, through the feelings of bone cracking and splintering and changing. He gasps for breath, and dull gray tears stick to his cheeks. His claws grate across the ground. Terror feels fit to choke him.

...the terror does not choke him.

He gets up half an hour later, shaky and uncertain and  _ alright.  _ Once he’s calmed himself down, he stumbles the rest of the way home and spends most of that afternoon preening in front of the bathroom mirror, turning his head this way and that to admire his collarless throat, and Sans teases him mercilessly for it.

“Alright, alright, you’re beautiful. Now some of us need to bathe, so move along—go stare at an icicle or something,” he says, pushing Gaster out of the bathroom. 

“I just might,” Gaster says, running a paw across the splint around his neck. 

“Lemme see.” Sans climbs onto his paw, and Gaster lifts it, allowing Sans to peer more closely at the bandages. “Does it hurt?”

“Oh, not too badly. Not any more than the collar did.”

“I’ll help you put the antibiotics on tonight,” Sans decides. 

“If you insist.”

“And hey—” He reaches up, touching Gaster’s muzzle. His eyes soften. “I’m glad. I hope you feel better now.”

Gaster chirrs fondly, nuzzling his son. “I do—much, much better.”

“Good.” Sans beams, hopping out of Gaster’s paw and back onto the floor. “Now go feel better somewhere else. Papyrus is actually  _ not  _ following me around, so maybe go play with him.”

Gaster leaps at the chance. It’s a rare one. He offers Papyrus a game of tug-of-war with a rope and a playbow, and Papyrus accepts it. The two of them crash their way through the living room, growling playfully, and Gaster lets Papyrus win, more often than not. It’s worth it, to see the gleam of delight in his baby’s eyes as he prances around the room, the rope swinging from his jaws. 

* * *

Papyrus’ surgery is a few short days later, and in the end, Gaster refuses to bring Papyrus to the hospital unsedated. Dr. Vanderpool agrees with his decision. It’s simply not worth the stress it would put the child under—or the danger it would put those around him in. Although Papyrus has never bitten anyone but Gaster, he still doesn’t feel it’s worth the risk. With that in mind, he lets the surgeon know, very clearly, that he expects Papyrus to be sedated at the house. It’s a bit of a hassle to get her to agree, but in the end, he’s the goddamn Royal Scientist (and he weaseled Asgore into putting a word in for him). 

But there are...stipulations.

“If he’s as dangerous as you say he is,” the surgeon, Dr. Theo, says over the phone, “and he’s going to be as stressed as you say he is, then we need to take precautions. Can you control him or not?”

Gaster hesitates.

“I’ll take that as a no. If that’s the case, I have rules. If you can’t abide by them, I won’t be coming to your home. I can’t put my team in danger. You understand that, don’t you, Dr. Gaster?”

“No, I—I understand,” he says. “And you’re right. I’m not sure I can control Papyrus. Sans might be able to, but I don’t want to force him into that situation. What would you have me do?”

“A blindfold. They use it on—”

“Animals,” Gaster says, cold. “I know. Papyrus isn’t an animal.”

“I don’t mean to insinuate that he is, but the objective is the same—take away his vision and he’ll be less likely to struggle. He won’t know he  _ needs  _ to struggle. Wrap him in a blanket to keep his limbs secure.”

“...right.” Gaster sighs, lifting a hind leg to scratch as his neck before quickly correcting himself and lowering his leg again. Ugh. His vertebrae  _ itch.  _ “I suppose we can do that.”

“And a muzzle.”

“What.” 

“A muzzle—to keep him from biting or blasting.”

“No.”

“Dr. Gaster—”

“I said  _ no,”  _ Gaster hisses, his spines lifting. “He doesn’t deserve to be muzzled. He’s not a beast.”

“No, he’s a child equipped with extremely sharp fangs, an enormous bite force, and dangerous magic, if what you’ve told me is correct. I simply can’t allow that to go unchecked. Muzzle him. It’s only for a few hours, and he won’t be awake, most of the time.”

Gaster seethes, his tail lashing until it strikes the table leg—yow yow  _ yow.  _

“It’s for his own safety.” Dr. Theo’s voice softens. “I know he’s a sweet kid, and he probably wouldn’t hurt anyone, but that’s an unnecessary risk to take. This way we can keep all of us safe. Take a few days—get him used to the muzzle so it doesn’t frighten him. Think about it. Let me know when you’ve made your decision.”

Gaster hangs up, then stalks downstairs and into the living room, where his boys are playing with their toy cars. Papyrus seems particularly infatuated with the red racecar. “Boys,” he says, trying his best to keep his voice calm. “I’m going out for a little while. How would you like to stay at Grillby’s?”

Sans looks at him for a moment, eyes sharp, and then scoops Papyrus up and stands. “Sure. I always say yes to Grillby’s.”

“So you do.” Gaster gently picks him up, depositing them both onto his back after squishing through the front door. He makes the short walk to Grillby’s in a few minutes, helping the boys off. Sans opens the door, and Gaster wedges his muzzle inside. “Grillbyyyy?”

_ Yes, my dear? _

“Can you watch the boys for a little while?”

_ I can. Sans, Papyrus, make yourselves at home. You can go and play in the back room, if you’d like. _

“‘kay. Thanks, Grillbz. Take care of yourself, pops,” Sans says, patting his snout gently. He hesitates for a moment before heading for the back room—but only a moment. Gaster knows what an act of faith that is, for a child so terrified of abandonment. As soon as the two of them are gone, Grillby crosses the bar and pushes Gaster’s head back outside. The door swings shut behind them.

_ Are you alright? _

“Yes, I’m fine. I’m just going to go to the forest for a while.”

_ Do you need me to come with you? _

He shakes his head. “No. I just need some time alone.”

_ Alright. Well, you have my number, if you need it. Behave. _

“Don’t I always?” 

Gaster takes his leave and bounds into the forest, heading away from town. As he does, he lets his anger prickle through his bones. It’s...terrifying, but he tries not to fight it. A muzzle! They want him to put a  _ muzzle  _ on his  _ baby.  _ Who knows what kind of association Papyrus has with muzzles? Were they used to render him defenseless while he was beaten, or operated on, or trained? Were they used to force him into helplessness, to remind him over and over and over again of his submission?

Gaster can’t do that to him. He  _ can’t. _

He takes a seat in the snow, his head hanging. He wants to tear the forest apart. His claws itch, and his shoulders ache and ache. He swallows hard. It’s...okay. It’s okay, Grillby said it was okay. He’s allowed to be angry, right? He deserves to be angry. This is a shitty situation and anyone in their right mind would be angry about it. 

...so why does he still feel so goddamned  _ afraid? _

He shuffles his paws in the snow. Perhaps he would feel better if he tore his claws through the trees, or blasted the snow to bare ground, but—something holds him back, some deep, immovable shame that sits in his chest. He sighs shakily. Of course it wouldn’t be easy. Of course. 

Why is it that when he  _ doesn’t  _ want to be angry it’s so easy to be, and when he  _ does  _ want to be angry, he can’t seem to manage it properly? Can he do  _ nothing  _ right? He snaps his jaws, then swipes his claws halfheartedly at a tree. Nothing. His anger fades as quickly as it came, and he slumps to the ground, groaning and pawing his muzzle. Emotions are such foolish, finicky things. There are times he wishes he didn’t have them at all.

...and then, inevitably, he remembers how happy his friends and family make him, and he decides that perhaps emotions aren’t all so bad.

A muzzle. They want him to muzzle Papyrus. The thought makes Gaster sick, although he knows it’s only logical. It’s safer for everyone involved—Papyrus included. He wallows there in the snow for several long minutes, warring with himself. A muzzle. A...muzzle. 

He’ll try it, he decides, although it disgusts him. He’ll introduce it to Papyrus and see how he reacts. If he reacts negatively, Gaster will refuse to put it on him; they’ll just have to figure something else out. Gaster will sedate Papyrus himself, if he has to. If Papyrus doesn’t seem to mind it, then he’ll let the doctors do their jobs, and then he’ll never, ever put a muzzle anywhere near Papyrus again. 

...but he does have an idea, regarding muzzles and dangerous creatures. He mulls it over on his way back to town. He mulls it over all throughout dinner, and his boys’ bathtimes, and the soft, quiet moments before sleep. It’s a good idea, he thinks. A good precaution. He’ll start working on it soon. 

The next day, he calls Dr. Theo to let her know he’ll muzzle Papyrus.

A few days after that, the surgical team arrives at his door. He ushers them all inside—Papyrus and Sans are upstairs, playing. Gaster hopes to keep Papyrus as calm as possible, although Sans is already jumpy with the knowledge of what’s about to happen. As the team prepares their equipment, Gaster heads upstairs with a tiny orange muzzle, a blindfold, a bottle of dilute peppermint oil, and a soft fleece blanket. 

“Hey, kiddos,” he says, slipping into Sans’ room. “It’s about that time.”

Sans’ mouth twists, and he sits up. Papyrus chews enthusiastically on his red racecar, chuffing a greeting to Gaster as he enters. “Are they already here?” Sans asks reluctantly.

“Afraid so,” Gaster says, setting down his things. “Let’s get him ready. He’ll feel a lot better soon.”

“He’d better,” Sans grumbles, reaching for the blanket. He swaddles Papyrus in it, and Papyrus squirms and whines in protest. “I know, I know, buddy. I’m sorry. You’ll be alright.”  _ Okay,  _ he signs.  _ Papyrus, it’s okay. _

Gaster nudges the peppermint oil forward. “Now that, please.”

Sans uncaps the bottle, dabbing oil onto his fingers before reaching for Papyrus’ muzzle. Papyrus’ eyes widen, and then he shudders and closes his eyes with a tiny, frightened sound. Quickly, Sans rubs the oil beneath his nasals, then pulls back and wipes his fingers off on his shorts. With his free hand, he rubs the back of Papyrus’ skull, a quiet little chirr rising in his chest. “It’s okay, Paps,” he murmurs. “It’s okay, it’s just peppermint, see? Smells like the toothpaste.”

Papyrus continues to tremble, although he cracks an eye open after a moment. He looks confused, more than anything.

“It’s to keep you from smelling the doctors,” Sans explains, bumping their foreheads together. “They smell icky. Like labs.”

They give Papyrus a moment to relax again, and gradually, he does, snuffling curiously at the air. He sneezes, and Gaster sighs fondly before reaching out with his magic—he won’t make Sans muzzle his own brother. He can’t. He scoops the muzzle up with his magic, then holds it up to Papyrus, studying him careful. Papyrus eyes the muzzle warily for a moment, glancing at Sans, and then at Gaster.

He leans forward and sticks his snout in, then holds it there patiently.

Gaster feels sick.

Quickly, he latches the muzzle’s straps behind Papyrus’ skull, then lets his magic fade. Sans reaches for the blindfold and drapes it over Papyrus’ eyesockets, tying it swiftly behind his head. Papyrus offers him a long-suffering sigh. He is the most put-upon puppy in the world, it is him. Once Papyrus is prepared, Sans rises and heads down the stairs. Gaster follows him.

Dr. Theo steps forward, studying Papyrus curiously. The surgeons and nurses stay quiet, for the most part, unwilling to startle him with their voices. Gaster flicks on the TV and flips the channel to  _ Phineas and Ferb.  _ He hopes the background noise will keep Papyrus from being too terribly unnerved by the strangers’ voices.

“Right,” Dr. Theo murmurs. “Lay him down on the couch and we’ll get to work.”

Papyrus winces at her voice, squirming, but Sans murmurs comfort to him as he sets him down on the couch. He stays close, and Gaster hovers over the proceedings, trying not to fuss. The anesthesiologist moves in, quickly setting up the IV stand for the intravenous anesthesia. They unwrap the blanket just enough to allow Papyrus’ foreleg out, and then promptly stabs him with the IV needle. Gaster expects Papyrus to yelp and struggle—

Instead, he releases a shuddering sigh and falls very, very still. 

“We’ll start the mask in the OR,” the anesthesiologist explains. “This should keep him calm enough for us to move him. We’ll just give it a few minutes to kick in.”

Sans sits on the couch, cradling Papyrus’ head in his lap and petting him quietly. Papyrus doesn’t respond at all—the only sign that he’s even awake is the fine trembling in his paw and the faint, almost inaudible, whine on each exhale. Approximately ten minutes later, they begin to move. Sans picks Papyrus up—he stirs groggily, then slumps against Sans’ chest. Loading them all up onto Gaster’s back is a hassle, and they’re heavy, even for him, but he’s the quickest way to travel. Horseback wouldn’t be much more effective, and they won’t all fit in the Riverperson’s boat, although several of them do choose to go that way. So it’s a run, for him—he keeps his stride as smooth and steady as he can, and they reach the clinic quickly.

Sans and Papyrus, along with Dr. Theo, the anesthesiologist, and a pair of nurses, disembark. They enter the clinic, and the nurses fetch a stretcher. Sans reluctantly sets Papyrus down on it, although he keeps on hand on his brother’s shoulder. Dr. Theo unwraps the blanket, handing it to Gaster. Gaster drapes it over Sans’ shoulders. 

“Alright, guys,” Dr. Theo says. “Here’s where we’ve gotta leave you. It’ll be a few hours. We’ll let you know once he’s in the recovery room, okay?”

“‘kay,” Sans says, frowning and folding his arms across his chest.

“Alright,” Gaster says, nudging Sans gently. “Thank you, doctor. We’ll be waiting.”

The surgical team wheels Papyrus through a set of double-doors, and Gaster sits, sighing softly. He and Sans stare at the doors for a long moment. This is the first time Papyrus has been away from either of them for extended amount of time, and it’s...unnerving, to say the least. The two of them settle into the waiting room.

It takes about ten minutes for Sans to get bored.

“Dad.”

“Yes, Sans?”

“I’m bored.”

“I’m sorry.”

He leans against Gaster’s shoulder. “Did you bring toys?”

Gaster rifles through his interdimensional box. “Uuuh—I have an organic modeling kit?”

“Oooh, cool.”

Gaster hands him the kit, and Sans opens it. He spends the next hour building exceedingly complex chemical structures and then having Gaster name them. It’s a good challenge. Gaster teaches him the naming conventions, and then  _ he  _ builds a few structures and lets Sans try to name them. 

After that, the two of them, in their desperation, turn to magazines. They’re in luck—an old issue of  _ National Geographic  _ is there for them to browse. That kills another half hour, and then Sans starts wandering the waiting room. There’s simply no way to keep a five-year-old (even a remarkably calm one) still for hours on end, so Gaster doesn’t bother to try. It isn’t as though Sans is bothering anything. As Sans chats with the other patients in the room, Gaster pulls out his phone and flicks through it. He has several messages from his friends, wishing Papyrus well, and a fond smile flickers across his face. 

They head to lunch, after two hours have passed, and eat bland hospital food. Gaster buys Sans a cookie, and Sans plunders the gift shop. By the time they return to the waiting room, Gaster’s interdimensional box overflows with bags of candy, a new fleece blanket, several action figures, a ‘get well’ card Papyrus absolutely won’t appreciate, a shiny balloon, and a bouquet of buttercups and primroses.

For the next hour, Gaster lets Sans play on his phone while he himself sprawls out on the waiting room floor and rests. He must doze, because he doesn’t realize his name is being called until Sans kicks him gently in the shoulder. “...aster? Dr. Gaster?”

He jerks his head up, whipping it around to face one of the nurses. “Yes,” he says. “Sorry, hello. What’s wrong?”

She smiles gently. “Nothing’s wrong. We’ve finished the surgery—it went smoothly. Your son is in the PICU with Dr. Theo, Room 134, if you’d like to head that way.”

Gaster practically bounds down the hall with Sans at his heels. They skid into the room, their eyes wide, and find their Papyrus sprawled out in a cot and surrounded by machines and wires and tubes and—

Gaster stumbles backwards, his chest heaving. Sans sets a hand on his foreleg and shoots him a meaningful  ~~ glare ~~ look, so Gaster gathers himself, takes a deep breath, and steps inside. Dr. Theo looks up at him, her eyes soft and steady. 

“Hello, Dr. Gaster.”

“Hello,” Gaster says, laying down at the foot of Papyrus’ cot. Sans pulls a chair up next to him, reaching out to touch his brother’s skull gently. “How did everything go?”

“It went very well. We removed the concentrator and all of the wires—they’ve been sent along to the evidence locker for the Judge to take a look at.”

“You got pictures?”

“We did.” Her mouth twists with disgust. “Whoever did that was exceedingly inhumane. I can’t imagine how painful it must have been for the poor thing. He’s going to be sore for a long while, after this, and he’ll need physical therapy to regain full range of motion. He’s been favoring his spine for so long that it’s going to be strange for him to move  _ without  _ paying attention to it. I’ll give you the name and number of someone who specializes in physical therapy with children. After that, you’ll need to…”

Gaster listens carefully as Dr. Theo gives him Papyrus’ discharge instructions—for tomorrow, unfortunately. The surgery was intensive enough that Papyrus will stay in the hospital for overnight observation—on the bright side, the PICU room is decorated cheerfully, and Gaster doubts it will remind him of any lab. Pictures of cartoon characters and dinosaurs festoon the walls, and after he’s added the bouquet, balloon, and action figures, it’s starting to look very cheerful. He also makes sure to keep the peppermint oil beneath Papyrus’ nasals fresh, lest he begin to scent the clinical stench that surrounds them. Any nurses or doctors who enter pull on sweaters or jackets to hide their scrubs, and not a single one wears a lab coat into the room. Gaster is beyond grateful for them.

Papyrus wakes up slowly and groggily, struggling to lift his head, and Gaster croons quietly to him. He lays his head back down and sighs. Sans shows him the ‘get well’ card and the balloon and the flowers, and Papyrus watches wearily. He doesn’t seem inclined to move at all, and he drifts in and out of sleep for several more hours. Gaster and Sans stay with him the entire night, and they’re discharged late the next afternoon.

Papyrus is...still not acting normally, but he can move his head and his tail and he responds to words and tactile stimuli. He even takes a few wobbly steps, when Dr. Theo sets him on the ground. Although the anesthesia has long since worn off, he doesn’t seem inclined to move or play, and he shows very little interest in any of the toys or snacks Sans offers him. Gaster can’t really blame the poor child—he must feel absolutely miserable. Gaster’s more than relieved when he gets to take them both back home. Being outside of the hospital, he’s sure, will benefit Papyrus more than anything. 

* * *

That evening, as Papyrus and Sans nap upstairs, Gaster heads for the basement. He has work to do, for once. He’s sure he has supplies around that he can make do with, and he already has all the dimensions he needs. He’s not much of a craftsman, but this won’t be particularly difficult. He hunkers down in front of his table with a knife, a strip of solid leather, and several buckles. In front of him, he places his little orange model, and he goes to work building a muzzle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: originally this chapter was Very Very different and involved a whole ‘nother character arc that didn’t make the final cut but that gave me Much Pain trying to edit out and around. also i think this is the longest chapter in the fic so !! that's a milestone!!
> 
> also happy friday the thirteenth, everyone!! :3


	27. the best of me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to/discussions of trauma, violence, injuries, death, child abuse and neglect, one (1) relatively brief but intense conversation regarding a fatal diagnosis

Papyrus  _ hurts.  _ He hasn’t hurt this way in a long time. He had hoped, perhaps, that he was done hurting. But that was not to be—the needles had returned, and the cots, and the muzzle, and the stink of anesthetic gas. He had awoken with the deep ache of surgery in his bones. It’s an ache he knows well. He’s only surprised that he had been put to sleep before the operation; Master rarely did that for him. But then—

But then, Papyrus hadn’t woken up in a cage. He’d woken up on a soft cot, with a sheet draped over his body. Dad and Sans had been there, with flowers and a strange, floating ball and a sheet of paper full of colors and scribbles. The world had smelled like crisp, cool peppermint. He had been so very tired. Moving sent bolts of soreness flaring down his spine, and so he had not moved until he was made to stand—he knew that test well. He took a few stumbling steps forward, and was allowed to return to his cot.

He rests. Sans brings him warm, mild soup and cherry jello, and he tries to eat most of it, if only to see his big brother smile. Dad lays at the foot of the cot for hours on end, talking quietly with Sans and the strangers who come and go. He reads Papyrus and Sans a few books, and Sans shows him a plastic kit full of small, colored pieces. “This is a modeling kit,” he explains, connecting two black spheres with a gray stick. “You can make different chemical structures. See, this one’s ethane. ‘Eth’ because there are two carbons, and ‘ane’ because they’re connected by a single bond. It’s easy, once you learn the rules.”

Despite Sans’ and Dad’s attempts to keep him occupied, Papyrus is...less than happy with his surroundings. He wants to growl at the strangers who near him, to ward them away from himself, and several times he almost does. (But his fear of the Staff is greater than his fear of them, and so he holds his silence.) More than that, though, he wants to hide underneath his cot; it’s only the pain throughout his spine that prevents him from moving. The rails alongside his mattress are far too imposing for him to dare climb over in this state.

Needless to say, when Dad takes them home, Papyrus is beyond relieved. Sans sets him down on the couch, and he’s content to stay there, layered underneath blankets with his favorite toy racecar next to his muzzle. He dozes for the rest of the evening, far more relaxed than he was at the strange surgery place. The distant murmur of cartoons plays as a familiar backdrop, and everything smells like Dad and Sans and himself. He’s...okay, actually.

He’s okay.

When he really for real wakes up, it’s dark outside. Sans curls up on the other end of the couch, a blue blanket draped over him. Dad lays on the floor next to them, his eyesockets closed. Papyrus pushes himself to sit up, then winces as little shivers of soreness roll down his spine. It feels like it did when Master put the little black box on him, all that time ago. He wonders what’s happened to him now. He wonders if it will make him grow larger, too, or if it will be something even worse. 

Weary at the very thought, he lays back down. He rests quietly, and he watches his father and his brother sleep, and he waits for the lights to come on outside. Sans and Dad both stir long before then, grimacing and growling quietly in their sleep—plagued, no doubt, by the same endless nightmares that Papyrus is. He’s grown to believe that those are simply a fact of life; every monster must have them. Sometimes, though, he has good dreams. He wishes those would happen more often.

Dad wakes first, stretching as much as he can without destroying important parts of the house (which is not very far). He lifts his head and blinks at Papyrus. Papyrus blinks back. “Good morning, little one,” Dad murmurs. “Have you been up long?”

It isn’t a Command, so Papyrus doesn’t respond. He stretches himself, then winces when it strains his back and falls limp again.

“You must be hungry, hm? I’ll go make us some breakfast.” Dad clambers to his feet, padding into the kitchen. When he returns, he has a bottle of milk and a bowl of warm, plain oatmeal. He offers Papyrus the bottle, first, holding it tentatively between his molars. Papyrus drinks, and the familiar flavor offers him great comfort. He wags his tail, once, to thank his father. When he’s finished nursing, he turns his attention to the oatmeal—it’s warm and sweetened, and, he realizes upon first bite, there are crunchy bits in it. The bits are even sweeter. 

...he likes it. He really likes it.

So, despite the fact he feels much too tired to eat, he finishes the whole bowl. Dad nuzzles him affectionately, then whisks away the dishes and returns with a cup and bowl for Sans and himself. Once they’ve all eaten, Papyrus and Sans lounge around watching cartoons as Dad slips out. “I’ll be in the basement if you need me,” he says. “I won’t be long.”

Papyrus lays his head down on the couch and sighs softly, closing his eyes. He feels Sans curl up on the other end of the couch again. The soft murmur of the TV in the background lulls him into a light doze—of course, all of his dozes are light. Sleep has never come easily for him. When he stirs again, Sans has flicked the TV off and sits with his nose in a book. Curiosity itches at Papyrus—it’s a new feeling, although he’s experienced it more and more often since coming to this strange new world. He wants to know what Sans is doing. He wants to be a part of it.

Tentatively, he pushes himself to his feet. His back aches, and he wobbles. 

“Hey.” Sans glances over at him. “You okay, buddy?”

Papyrus limps in his direction, settling down next to him and placing his head in Sans’ lap so he can see the book’s pages. A tiny, gentle hand settles on his head, and he chuffs quietly in contentment. Sans begins to read aloud, his voice rising and falling in a familiar cadence, and Papyrus struggles to understand him. He speaks their father’s commandless language, most of the time, and although Papyrus has gotten better at comprehending it, he’s far from perfect.

They spend most of that day resting. Sans coaxes him into eating little blocks of cheese that somehow, miraculously, make most of the pain coursing through his spine vanish—but they also make him very sleepy and vaguely nauseous. He naps on and off and only stirs to eat or to let Sans change the bandages wrapped around his vertebrae. Neither Sans nor Dad forces him to move or train or play, and he is stupidly grateful for that. He doesn’t understand why they treat him so kindly, but he’s a beast. He’s not supposed to understand what real monsters think, now, is he?

The next day, the strange fire-man comes over. He talks a while with Dad, his hands flickering with movement, and then Dad comes over to nudge Papyrus and Sans gently. “I’m going to Dr. Willow’s now,” he says, and Papyrus tries to set a paw on his muzzle—but it causes a streak of pain to course from his shoulder to his tail-tip, so he winces and doesn’t try again. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours.”

“Okay. Hey—” Sans leans forward, resting his forehead against Dad’s. “I’m proud of you. It’s gonna be alright.”

Dad closes his eyes, warbling softly. Papyrus tries to chirp encouragement at him, although the sound is croaky and unpracticed. It makes Dad smile, nevertheless. 

Then Dad leaves, and they’re left alone with the fire-man. Sans and the man talk with their hands, and Papyrus looks quietly at his paws. This, too, is another thing that was not made for beasts. (And yet even Dad manages it, somehow—so perhaps it’s only Papyrus that doesn’t deserve these things. The thought is a strangely bitter one.) 

The fire-man plays hide-and-seek with Sans, and he offers Papyrus a stuffed bear to snuggle. The bear, he tells Papyrus, is named Belly—short for Belous. Papyrus thinks that’s a rather silly name, but even so, he wraps himself around it and watches the fire-man’s light flicker along the wall with half-lidded eyes. It reminds him of the old house, behind the big purple wall. It reminds him of fallen leaves, of soft white paws and the smell of butterscotch-cinnamon pie. For a moment, he feels sick with longing.

The moment passes.

Lunch is chicken nuggets and fries. Papyrus digs into the fries, chewing happily, and the fire-man flickers in soft greens. For a moment, Papyrus hesitates. Then he reaches over, carefully picking a chicken nugget up in his jaws and depositing it onto the fire-man’s plate. It’s one of the few gestures of goodwill he’s learned, over the past few weeks. Giving food to another person seems to be a sign of affection—or, at the very least, a sign of mutual goodwill.

The fire-man eats the chicken nugget, and Papyrus wags his tail in approval. He wags it again when the fire-man offers him more fries. Having established such peaceful report with this stranger, he rests more easily, although nothing beats the peace he gains when Dad returns safe and sound (albeit, Papyrus thinks, wearier than normal). Dad loops himself around the living room, and the fire-man stays until late in the evening. 

The next week passes in a similar fashion (minus, thank goodness, another surgery). Slowly, Papyrus mends. His pain fades, and his energy begins to return. He limps along after Sans whenever he can, unwilling to be left out of any activity. They play cars, and hide-and-seek, and Sans shows him how to play make-believe with action figures. They read stories and watch cartoons and Sans colors while Papyrus chews on his crayons. The wax turns his teeth orange, and Dad sighs fondly and scrubs them off with a washcloth. Papyrus smacks his jaws with distaste, then stumbles off to chew on a blue crayon.

Then, one day, a new stranger enters his house. She’s a hare with long ears and dusky brown fur, and she strolls towards him without any hesitation. Dad and Sans don’t stop her. Papyrus skitters beneath the couch and tucks his tail—usually people leave him alone when he does that. The hare doesn’t. Instead, she kneels next to the couch and studies him with glossy black eyes. He taps his claws.  _ Tap, tap.  _

“Er—” Dad starts. “You might want to give him space. He’s—”

“Frightened, yes, I can see that,” the hare says, her voice sad. She leans back, lolloping towards Dad. “Well, let’s go over our options. Dr. Theo sent me the x-rays, so I’ve already got an idea of what we need to do. The physical healing will be the easy part. The psychological healing, less so. It’s going to be difficult for me to work with him if he won’t let me near him, and it’s doubly difficult because he can’t follow instructions.”

Papyrus sniffs, offended. He’s very good at following instructions,  _ actually.  _ It’s only that people don’t give him Commands, anymore, except sometimes  _ come here  _ or  _ no.  _

Dad and the stranger talk a while, and Papyrus slinks upstairs and into Sans’ room. 

“Hi, Paps,” Sans says, glancing away from his pile of legos. “What’s up?”

Papyrus chuffs at him, laying down rather stiffly next to the legos. Sans tosses him one, and he chews halfheartedly on it. It tastes like plastic. 

“They’re talking about your physical therapy,” Sans explains, clicking two blocks together before placing them on top of his stack. It wobbles precariously. “It’ll make you feel better. I don’t think they’re gonna start it until you’re more used to being around people, though. I know Dad has been talking about socialization ideas with Dr. Vanderpool. She wants to start you on some anti-anxiety meds before trying anything too scary. Dad says you’re really young for that, but you’re also, uuuh, super stressed all the time constantly.”

Papyrus whuffs his agreement, spitting the block out. 

“So maybe you can try the meds just until you’re more used to things,” Sans says reasonably. “Then, when everything seems less scary, you can wean off of them again.” He clicks another block onto the tower. “I hope it helps. I’m ready for everything to go back to normal, you know what I mean?”

Another block. This time the tower leans too far, and it topples. 

“Eh,” Sans says. “Maybe you don’t. I guess ‘normal’ for you wouldn’t be a great thing to go back to.”

Papyrus snatches up another block. This time it splinters between his teeth, and Sans groans.

The next day is an extra-snowy one, and Papyrus gets the feeling that Sans is going more than a little stir-crazy. He paces his room, and he fiddles with his blocks and his books and the organic modeling kit Dad had given him, but he never settles on one thing. Eventually, they take to snooping around the house as Dad reads in the living room. 

“Dad?” Sans calls down the stairs.

“Yes, Sans?”

“Can I look at your books?”

“Just make sure you put them back where you got them, please.”

So they enter Dad’s room. Papyrus snuffles along the bed, and Sans lifts him so he doesn’t have to jump. He curls up, sighing contentedly. Beds are  _ so _ much better than floors. Sans scans Dad’s books, then pulls one out. It’s smaller than the rest, dusty and tattered. It stinks of smoke, and Papyrus wrinkles his nose.

“Huh,” Sans says, taking a seat next to him. “Check this out.”

He cracks it open, and the spine creaks wearily. It’s a book of sketches, although many of the pages have been scorched beyond recognition. Papyrus lifts his head, intrigued. He’s never seen Dad sketching before. 

“Woah. Cool.” Sans runs his fingers over the paper, and they come away flaked with ash. The first sketch they pause on is of a skeleton woman in a long dress. There’s a little girl next to her, one arm wrapped around her legs, and behind them stands a quaint little house in a field. The signature is an illegible scrawl, as is the date. “That’s not Dad’s font. I wonder who made this?”

He flips to the next page. The second sketch is smaller—the same skeleton woman’s smiling face, her eyesockets crinkled at the edges as she laughs. Those eyes remind him of Sans. The third sketch is of a trio of skeleton children, their faces smudged with dirt and wide grins on their faces. Sans continues to flip through the pages, studying each sketch fervently. Most of them are of skeletons, and seem to be centered around that same little house in the field. There are animals, too. Dogs and cows and chickens. On one page, there’s a sketch of a pair of water elementals. On another, a sketch of an armored centaur and a werewolf. 

Near the center of the book, there’s a sketch of a dragon. This one has been lovingly colored—its scales gleam in faded yellows and tawny oranges. A patch of scales is missing from its shoulder, revealing dusky gray skin. Its wings, buttery yellow, are brilliantly translucent. An elemental sits on its back; a little blue flame with a brilliant sword. The dragon’s neck arches nobly, its tail curved behind it. Above it, a word. Only the first three letters are legible:  _ isk. _

“Grillby would love this,” Sans breathes, brushing his thumb along the page. “We gotta show him.”

He scoops the book up, sets Papyrus gently on the floor, and then races downstairs. Papyrus follows more slowly, his back protesting any rapid movement he asks of it. 

“Dad, look!” Sans skids to a stop, showing Dad the dragon. “Look how neat this is.”

“Ah, that.” Dad leans forward, snuffling the pages. “Pretty cool, huh?”

“Where’s it from? Who drew it?”

“I brought it with me from the surface; it’s the only thing I have to remember my family, so do be gentle with it. I’m not sure who drew it—my father, I assume. He’s the only one who isn’t in the pictures. Although—” Dad reaches forward, gently taking the book and flipping to a page near the back. This one looks like it was a sketch of the family, at one point, though half of it is burned away now. Dad taps a talon on a single skeleton leg; the torso and everything above it has been charred into nothing. “This was my father. Your grandfather. Er—a part of him, anyhow.”

Sans sits down next to Dad, leaning back against his shoulder and reaching out to touch the page. His fingers come away smudged with soot. Papyrus curls up in his lap, warbling quietly in curiosity and snuffling the air. “What was he like? Before he left?”

“I don’t know,” Dad admits softly. “I haven’t seen him in a very, very long time. He left when I was only a little younger than you.”

“Why? Where did he go?”

“I don’t know.”

“What?” Confusion flashes across Sans’ face. “How can you not know? There has to be a reason.”

Dad shrugs, glancing towards the windows. “If there was, he didn’t enlighten me. He just...left. I don’t know why. My mother never told me; of course, I was only four when she died. Perhaps she was waiting until I was older. Who’s to say? Anyhow, I don’t suppose it matters much, now.”

“Of course it matters.” Sans scowls, and Papyrus snaps his teeth, trying to support his brother’s anger. Whatever he’s angry about, Papyrus is sure it’s worthwhile. “Ugh. I can’t believe he’d just leave you like that.”

“Well, don’t get worked up about it.” Dad chuckles, nudging him. “It doesn’t bother me anymore. What’s done is done. Time moves forward, and we with her.”

“It’s not fair.”

“No.” Dad tilts his head. “Few things are.”

Sans folds his arms across his chest, growling irritably. Papyrus growls with him.

“The both of you, honestly.” Dad lays his head in front of them, yawning. “I think it’s about time for two little skeletons to take a nap. You’re too moody.”

“I’m not  _ moody.  _ I’m  _ angry.  _ How come you’re not? Your dad abandoned you. That’s something to be angry about.”

“...if you’re still angry about me leaving you, after what happened with Jackson, I—”

“No!” Sans rubs his palms over his face. “No, I’m not mad about that. Okay, well. I am, but I’m not trying to guilt you about it. I’m just saying this is something you should be upset about. I don’t understand how you can just ignore it.”

“Time heals all wounds,” Dad says philosophically, closing his eyes, “and she has been at work for quite a while on that particular one.”

“...yeah.” Sans reaches, setting a hand on Dad’s skull. He doesn’t sound happy. “I guess. What about the lady? Who your dad sketched?”

“Oh, her.” A warm smile flickers across Dad’s face. He opens his eyes, flipping to a sketch of the skeleton woman. “That’s my mother, Consolas Gaster. Your grandmother. She was a wonderful person. You would have liked her, if you’d met her.”

“What was she like?”

“She was brilliant.” Dad looks fondly at the sketch. “She knew how to command a room. A vital skill, I suppose, when one has nine children. Moreover, she was one of the best cooks I knew—only Grillby has ever surpassed her. And she was brave.” For a moment, Dad’s eyes look distant, far-away. Papyrus reaches out and sets a paw carefully on his ribcage. “...I’m sure she would have fought very hard against the humans, in the end.”

“I’m sorry she died.”

“Thank you, little one. For what it’s worth, I think that if she could have met the two of you—” Dad smiles; it’s the rare kind of smile that reaches his eyes. “—she would have been very proud.”

“Of course she would be,” Sans says, beaming. “You’re something worth being proud of.”

Dad blinks. “Oh, no, I meant—I meant she would be proud of you—”

“I know what you meant. But she’d be proud of you, too.” Sans reaches out, resting a hand on Dad’s nose. “I know it.”

“Ah.” Dad’s eyes shine. He presses his muzzle to Sans’ chest, and Sans hugs him. “You have always been the best of me.”

Papyrus clicks his teeth, inching forward. Sans reaches out and pulls him gently into the hug, and Papyrus tries very hard to hold still and be good. 

“You, too,” Dad amends, nuzzling him. “Sans and Papyrus—I hope I’ll always give you the best of me.”

* * *

A few days later, there are dogs at the door. Papyrus stands stiffly in the living room, his head down and his eyes narrowed. Sans touches the back of his skull. “It’s okay,” he says. “It’s just the dogs. They’re nice monsters, promise.”

A pair of floppy-eared white dogs enter his territory, and he bristles. He’s pleased to find, however, that they respectfully avert their eyes and lower their tails. He relaxes, if only minutely. They approach Sans quietly, slowly, and Papyrus keeps a close eye on them. Dad snakes a paw forward and pulls Papyrus towards his chest, snuggling him close. Papyrus sighs and resigns himself to it.

Sans takes a seat on the couch, and the dogs sit on either side of him. One of them has a notepad. The other has a strange black box. Papyrus rests his chin on Dad’s paw and listens as they begin to talk. They ask Sans lots of odd questions, and Sans answers them. It seems like he’s telling them about Master, and about what happened in Papyrus’ first home. Both of the dogs look horrified. Papyrus doesn’t quite know why, but he wishes he did.

Still, the dogs don’t stop their questioning. If anything, they dig deeper—deeper, even, than the strange snake-lady had, prying for details that make Sans squirm in discomfort. Soon, even Dad begins to tremble. Papyrus glances up at him. He reaches out, resting a paw against Dad’s sternum, and tries to make the noise Dad has made for him, when he wakes up restless and unnerved—a soft chirr. Dad trembles more violently, and he pushes himself to his feet.

“I’ll be back in just a moment,” he murmurs. “Dogaressa, Dogamy, could you…?”

“We’ll watch them,” one of the dogs assures him. “Are you well?”

Dad nods rapidly, then stumbles outside. Papyrus takes a hesitant step after him. Did he...do something wrong? Was he not meant to make that noise? 

“Hey, Paps.” Sans picks him up, careful not to twist his spine too far. When he sits again, he settles Papyrus on his lap. Papyrus scowls up at the dogs when they look at him for too long, and they both obligingly glance away again. Sans continues to flicker nervous glances at the door. “Right. Um. What was the question?”

“How did you escape?”

Sans rubs his eyes. “My dad. He came for us. He…”

Papyrus tunes out the rest of the conversation—it isn’t as though he understands most of it. Eventually, the dogs stop asking questions, and they start making dinner. Papyrus likes them a little better, after that. They eat sandwiches and bacon, and then Papyrus and Sans settle in to watch cartoons—or at least Papyrus settles in to watch cartoons, and Sans settles in beside him. His eyes are only for the front door, though.

The phone rings, once, and one of the dogs answers it.

“It’s Grillby,” they say to Sans, cupping a paw over the receiver. “Your dad’s alright. He’ll be back very soon, but you two shouldn’t wait up. He says to tell you goodnight, and that he loves you.”

“Oh.” Sans’ shoulders slump. “Yeah. That’s—okay. Tell him goodnight too, and that we love him.”

The dogs sleep on the couch, and he and Sans head up to their bedroom. Papyrus snuggles up next to his brother’s chest, and Sans drapes an arm over him. “Night, Paps,” he murmurs. Papyrus yawns in agreement. It takes him a long time to fall asleep, but he thinks it must take Sans even longer, because when he wakes a few hours later, Sans is still gazing out the window.

* * *

“ —can’t do it!” Gaster wails, clawing at the crest of his skull. A pair of manifested hands slash through the air, signing his words. “I  _ can’t do it,  _ Grillby!” 

A warm hand on his elbow. He shudders, cracking one eye open so he can see Grillby.

_ Enough. You’re doing well. Just breathe. _

He takes a gulping breath, and then another. “I can’t do it,” he repeats. “I can’t do it, I’m sorry, I’m trying, I swear I am, I  _ am—” _

_ What are you trying to do? Explain it to me simply. _

“I’m trying to—to feel better, trying to feel,” Gaster fumbles, scraping his paws over his eyes. “I was angry, I was so angry, when Sans said—when he told them—”

Told them how Jackson kidnapped him. How Jackson strapped him to a table and severed his bones without even a numbing shot to ease the pain. How Jackson threw him into a cage like a fucking beast, how Jackson told him Gaster loved him like a master loves a _dog,_ how—

He hisses, ramming his skull into the nearest tree trunk. It creaks and collapses. 

And what’s worse, this doesn’t even make sense! Sans had said the exact same things to Dr. Vanderpool—albeit with less detail—and Gaster had been  _ fine.  _ He’d been perfectly calm. Why is he feeling this way now? Why the  _ fuck  _ are his emotions such terrible, unpredictable, conflicting things nowadays?

_ You have every right to be angry,  _ Grillby assures him, standing back as Gaster hovers over the tree, panting. His claws itch to tear it apart. His chest burns with shame.  _ You don’t have to fight it. _

“I’m trying not to!” Gaster wails, his haunches thumping to the ground. “I’m trying not to, I want to be angry, I want to get rid of it but I  _ can’t,  _ I just can’t, there’s something—something—” He holds a paw over his chest, over the shard of burning shame that won’t fucking  _ leave him alone,  _ that whispers  _ you’re not fit to be a person, not fit to be a monster, not fit to be a  _ father—

What would his babies think, if they saw Gaster like this?

Tears roll over his eyesockets, and he buries his muzzle in the snow. 

_ Oh, Wings.  _ Grillby crouches next to his head, resting a hand on his skull. Gaster shivers, digging his claws into the snow. They crunch through the permafrost. How easily they could crunch through flesh—through bone. It’s what they were made to do, after all.  _ Hush. It’s alright. You don’t have to force anything. _

“I just want to stop feeling this way,” Gaster whispers. “I’m trying to do what you said. I’m trying to be okay with feeling angry. I thought—I thought once I did that, it would get easier, but I just—I feel so terrible about it, Grillby. I feel like a—a—”

A beast. A weapon. A murderer.

“—bad person.”

Grillby pets him—a gentle, slow movement from the crest of his skull to the brace around his neck.  _ You aren’t a bad person. Good people feel anger just as strongly as bad people do, my dear. Anger is not an evil thing, and neither are you.  _ Grillby leans his forehead against Gaster’s jaw.  _ You could never be. _

Gaster sniffles, rubbing a paw across his eye. “You’re so sure? I feel as though I could do very—very evil things, somehow.”

_ Any person can do evil things,  _ Grillby assures him.  _ But you won’t. I’m sure of it. I know you, Wings.  _

“I thought I knew me, too.” Gaster glances up, at the distant fog that rolls beneath the cavern ceiling. “But the things I’ve been feeling, the things I’ve been thinking—I never knew I could think things like that, before. It seems there’s always something new to learn.”

_ Yes,  _ Grillby admits.  _ But doesn’t that excite you? You’re a scientist, after all. _

“...it used to.”

_ Not any longer? _

Gaster remains quiet.

_ Have you talked to your therapist about this? _

“About some of it,” Gaster admits. “I mean—our first meeting was merely perfunctory. I briefed them on everything that had happened, why I was there, and they sat and took their notes and—I don’t know? Thought about it? I don’t know what they were doing, I have no idea what they were thinking or if I did good or bad or if I told them too much or not enough or—

_ Wings. You’re overthinking this. _

“I overthink everything,” he moans, scraping his paws over his skull.

Grillby chuckles, little rings of white smoke drifting from his mouth.  _ That you do, that you do—nevertheless, I’m sure you did fine. Give them time. They’ll help. And if they don’t, we’ll find you someone who will. It’s a process. _

“I just want to be done with it  _ now.” _

_ Did you ever hear the story of Sisyphus? _

“Of what?”

_ Sisyphus. He was one of the humans’ myths, before the war. He was a king who was condemned to push a heavy boulder up a hill, but every time it reached the top it would roll back down and he’d have to start all over again. _

“And here I thought you were going to cheer me up.”

_ It feels a lot like that, sometimes. Everything goes well for a little while. You feel like you’re getting somewhere, like things are looking up. You push your boulder all the way to the stop, you stop and breathe and look around and it is  _ beautiful. Grillby inhales deeply, his flames flaring in appreciation. 

“And then...?”

_ Then it rolls back down—sometimes all the way down. Sometimes it goes halfway. Sometimes it only slides back a few inches before you dig your heels in and catch it again. But it’s a struggle, holding the boulder at the top like that, day after day after day. It’s hard. Don’t expect to be perfect at it, especially not so soon.  _

“Does it ever stop rolling back? Can you ever quit holding onto it?”

_...I don’t know. I don’t feel as though I’ve ever been able to—sometimes I can forget about it for days at a time. Weeks, even, if I’m lucky, but it’s always there. That boulder’s a part of who I am. You can be mad about it. You can be sad. You can be sick of all this work you’ve got to do that others don’t. That’s okay—they’ve all got their boulders, too. The only thing that matters is that when that boulder slides down, you get up and you dust yourself off and you get back to work. Rest if you need to, but do not wallow. Keep going. You’ll see the top again. _

“And when I get to the top again,” Gaster grumbles, “I’m putting down superglue.”

Grillby crackles with laugher, leaning back against Gaster’s shoulder. For a moment, the two of them rest in silence, admiring the patterns in the fog that roll far above their heads.

“So,” Gaster finally asks, “what did he do wrong? Sisyphus?”

_ He wanted to persevere. He made a fool of death twice over. _

“...kind of a sad thing to be punished for.”

_ Yes. I thought so, too. Now, don’t you want to go back home? It’s warmer there, and your boys will be worrying. _

“Yes, they will, won’t they? Poor things. I hate leaving them so often.” But it’s better to leave them than to expose them to this  _ hate,  _ isn’t it? Weary, he heaves himself to his feet—then, suddenly, agony jolts through his back and shoulders. He cries out, quite unpleasantly surprised.

_ What’s wrong?  _ Grillby asks, sparking in alarm.

“It  _ hurts!”  _ he hisses, whirling around and snapping angrily at his own spine. The pain does not abate. If anything, it grows worse by the second, and his voice grows more frantic. “It  _ hurts,  _ why won’t it just  _ stop,  _ just  _ leave me alone— !” _

The pain fades for a split second, and he drops his head, panting.

_...you should see a doctor again,  _ Grillby says. He looks...frightened, and that curdles Gaster’s terror in his chest. _ Something’s wrong. _

“Oh, I know something’s wrong,” Gaster says, laughing weakly, “but it isn’t anything they can fix.”

_ Then what is it? _

Gaster trembles. “I don’t know, but—my soul. It would make the most sense. It can’t maintain this form.”

_ It’s trying to change back? _

“Perhaps. Or perhaps this form is simply crumbling.”

Grillby reaches out, curling a hand possessively around his ulna.

“I won’t let it happen,” Gaster murmurs. Pain spasms through his shoulders again, and he jams his muzzle into the snow and screams. Grillby stays with him long into the night, stroking his back and shoulders; the heat of him does little to burn the pain away, but Gaster doesn’t have the heart to tell him that. 

It’s hours before the pain abates—longer than ever before, and all the more terrifying because of it. When morning comes, he lays panting and exhausted in the snow. He drags himself to his feet. He has...so many things to do. Therapy, and statements, and appointments, meals to cook, baths to give, children to raise. He can’t afford to stay here any longer. He won’t abandon his children—not again. Not ever again. He’ll be good for them. He will give them the best of him, no matter what it takes.

_ You’re going to the doctor’s tomorrow,  _ Grillby says firmly.

“They can’t tell me anything I don’t already know.”

_ It wasn’t a request. _

Gaster sighs softly, closing his eyes. “...very well. If it would comfort you,” he murmurs, picking Grillby up and settling him on his back, sore though it is. Together, they begin the slow, cold trek home. 

* * *

“So?” Gaster sits hunched over in the exam room, his tail curled around his feet. He watches his doctor expectantly as she enters the room. Her face is...grave. “What’s wrong? It isn’t that bad, is it? I’ve been getting better, haven’t I?”

Dr. Gabi stands across from him, holding her clipboard to her chest. “You have been getting better,” she says quietly. “The state of your soulmagic has improved, according to the data I received from Dr. Yeoman. However, your magic—or lack thereof—is what bothers me. It’s of no immediate concern, but—” She lets out a soft breath.

“But what? Don’t sugarcoat it. How long have I got left?”

“Two years.”

Gaster’s breath stutters in his chest. His world grinds to a sudden, stuttering halt. Two...years…? That’s not possible. He was—ten, he was hoping desperately for ten, and that’s not much more but it seems a vast difference now. Surely she can’t be correct. He’s going to live longer than that. He  _ has  _ to live longer than that. “If I—if I keep improving—”

“Two years is your maximum. If your soul recovered entirely, you would have two years. At the rate you’ve been recovering…”

“Months. I have months.”

Dr. Gabi inclines her head. Deep sorrow lines her face. 

“What if I—what if I could use less magic?” Gaster asks—a desperate bid, but one he’s willing to make. “What if I could shift into a smaller form?”

“You believe you could do that?”

“I believe it’s a possibility.”

“It could increase your lifespan. Not by much, but certainly by a few months. Perhaps even an entire year.”

“Three years,” Gaster breathes. It seems infinitely better than two. It seems infinitely worse than the time he’d hoped to have. Papyrus—Papyrus won’t have started kindergarten. Sans will be in the second grade. What will happen to them? A foster home? Adoption? Papyrus won’t take well to that. He’s already been through so much—to abandon him, to abandon either of them again, and so soon, it seems—seems—

Gaster lowers his head and takes a shuddering breath. His chest feels tight with panic.

“I’m sorry, Dr. Gaster.” Dr. Gabi rests a gentle hand on his arm. “I’m so sorry.”

Three years. Three years to finish giving his boys his best.

...he’d better get started.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so first First forgive me
> 
> second!! i hope everyone is enjoying their quarantines and is staying healthy and okay !!! if you're ever bored, feel free to pester me on my tumblr bc i have a sudden overabundance of free time now aaAAAA--
> 
> and last but not least, fun fact: i met the world's Most Stressed Out Dog (who, being my best friend's dog, i have also claimed as My Favorite Nephew) the other day and he 9000% reminded me of paps. he's a super cute puppy and his name's bailey but my g o d he has some serious anxiety. fortunately !! they took him to the vet the day after i met him to get advice and he got prescribed prozac so !! here's hoping that helps him! this one's for u, bailey boy u.u


	28. wings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: discussions of trauma/murder/neglect/abuse/torture, violent + sadistic thoughts, mentions of gore, body horror, flashback, symptoms of ptsd, self-loathing
> 
> aND WE HAVE GREAT ART RE: THE SISYPHUS METAPHORS FROM THE LAST CHAPTER [HERE](https://ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber.tumblr.com/post/613612625455202304/sysyphus-metaphors%22) BY @KSENYA-AND-THE-ARTISTIC-CUCUMBER!!!!! thank you again ksenya a;ldjgk; !!!

Gaster needs to change, and he needs to change quickly. He can’t push it off any longer, no matter how sick the thought of a shift makes him. He needs _all three damn years_ he has left, and he’s not going to get them if he’s stuck in this stupid, magic-wasting form. Sure, he’s absolutely terrified, but it’s like Grillby says, right? He needs to stop being such a coward and face his emotions, no matter how much they make him want to curl up into a ball and retch his soul out and shiver and shiver and _shiver and—_

“Sans,” he says, the morning after his death sentence. Sans glances over at him, a handful of cereal halfway to his mouth. “I think I’m going to be leaving for a little while.”

Sans frowns, dropping the cereal back into his bowl—but there’s already a weary sort of acceptance in his eyes. “How come?”

“I don’t want to stay in this form any longer.”

“Oh.” Sans’ face softens, and he crosses the kitchen to sit next to Gaster. “Okay. Are you—do you think you can change back already?”

“That’s the thing.” Gaster lays his head on the floor. “I’ll certainly try, but it may be difficult. I’m going to go along with Grillby and see if we can’t figure it out.”

It’s going to mean a tremendous amount of pain, of _terror,_ and he just knows he won’t be able to control himself through it. Best he goes as far away as he can, so no one has to witness his hurting. (No one save Grillby, that is. Grillby, who’s already seen him brought low and miserable and demanded to stay at his side. Gaster wouldn’t have anyone else.)

“I can’t leave you and Papyrus alone for so long, of course,” he continues. “Would you like Alphys to come and stay with you? Asgore’s busy preparing for the Judgement, but—well, I think it would make Alphys feel better if I let her look after you. She’s been a bit down.”

“Ever since you told her you didn’t trust her? Yeah, I can imagine that.”

Gaster sniffs. “I spoke only the truth.”

“I know you did, pops. That’s what hurt her the most.”

“Nevertheless, this could be a sort of—of olive branch. Would you be okay with her watching you?”

“Yeah, that’s fine. I’ve missed hanging out with her.”

“And you won’t get up to any trouble?” Gaster turns a critical eye on him.

“Hey, you know me, old man.” Sans holds his hands up in surrender, grinning. “I am trouble-free. No worries over here. Hakuna matata.”

“Yes,” Gaster says, rather unconvinced. “Right. Well, I’ll give her a call…”

After he’s arranged for his children’s care, he slinks into the basement for a brief moment, resting a paw on the thick leather straps of the muzzle he’s so carefully constructed. It does make him anxious, using this. He had rather hoped not to, but he doesn’t trust himself. Perhaps he’s capable of managing everyday emotions—perhaps he’s even capable of managing small bursts of anger or sadness or pain. This shift, though? This shift is going to be hours, if not days, of agony and terror and rage. He’s not ready for that. 

(He doesn’t think he’ll ever be, if he’s honest with himself.)

So he scoops up the muzzle and slips it into his phone’s interdimensional box, then pads outside. Grillby—loyal, ever-patient, remarkable Grillby—waits for him in the forest, studying the trees around him with his hands folded neatly behind his back. Snow falls gently around him, evaporating into the halo of light and heat he creates. He’s beautiful, Gaster thinks, in the way only wild things can be. When he sees Gaster approaching, he turns and smiles that soft, golden smile of his.

...Gaster’s soul feels very warm, suddenly. He trips quite inelegantly over a snowdrift.

 _Ah, hello, Wings,_ Grillby says, crackling in amusement. _Good morning._

Gaster pushes his head to Grillby’s chest, and Grillby obligingly scratches beneath his chin. “Good morning, Grillby.”

 _What are we up to today?_ He steps back, studying Gaster. _You seem to be doing alright._

“Well. Well, I went to the doctor’s, yesterday.”

Grillby goes very still—even the tips of his flames barely waver, for a second. _...and?_

“And everything is alright, for the time being,” Gaster assures him. Grillby visibly deflates with relief, his flames dimming for a moment. “That being said, this form is too taxing. It’s a strain my soul doesn’t need, so I want to shift back today.”

Grillby hesitates. _The doctor recommended this?_

“I was the one who suggested it, but she didn’t disagree.”

Grillby’s mouth twists.

“I know it isn’t ideal timing, but it must be done. I can’t live this way for months. This form is big, and bulky, and inconvenient, and a waste of magic I ought to be giving to my boys— or at the very least using to keep my bones looking like something other than Swiss cheese. So I want to change, even if it’s scary.”

_Like this?_

“Like what?”

Grillby gestures around them. _You want to change like this? In the middle of a forest with no medical equipment, no pain medication, no sedation, nobody to help if something goes wrong, no—_

 _“You’re_ here to help,” Gaster points out, “and I don’t need or want those other things. I can handle this. Besides, being back in a hospital to shift would feel like—you know. It’s a bit too familiar.”

 _I—I suppose._ The frown doesn’t leave Grillby’s face. _I just—I’m not going to be much help, if the shift goes badly. I can offer you emotional support, but for something like this, it seems as though you may need...more._

“I don’t need you to help me through the shift,” Gaster assures him. “That’s got to do with my magic, and I’ll have to struggle with it on my own. It’s something I’m prepared to do. I value your support, naturally, but I’d also like for you to do for me what you said you would. Make sure I don’t hurt anyone, won’t you?”

Grillby pauses for a long moment, his flames crackling unhappily. Then: _Let me get this straight: you want me to be your safety net because you’re willingly putting yourself into a situation that’s going to hurt and agitate you to such a point you think you’re going to become unmanageable._ He lifts his hands, drops them. After a brief second, he lifts them again to sign quite decisively, _I hate it._

“But it’s just like you said,” Gaster insists. “I can’t let my fear of my emotions rule me. At some point, I’m going to have to face them, and—”

 _This isn’t what I meant. It’s one thing to face the emotions as they come, but it’s another entirely to_ force _yourself into a situation where you’re going to be hurt._

“But it has to be done one way or another, so I figured—I figured maybe your offer still stood.” He shuffles his paws. “If it makes you terribly uncomfortable, however, you’re more than free to go. I’d hate to put you in a difficult situation.”

Grillby sighs heavily. _I—damn it, Wings. I can’t just leave you to do it alone. There’s no way I can convince you to do this somewhere, some_ how, _safer?_

“...nowhere else feels safe,” Gaster admits quietly. “Our houses are surrounded by the townspeople, and I don’t want to hurt them. Asgore’s house is too close to the prison. I wouldn’t trust myself not to do something foolish if I become upset so near Jackson. I don’t particularly want to shift in a lab, or in a hospital, for obvious reasons.”

_...I don’t like it._

“Please?” Gaster sets his head on the snow, offering Grillby his best puppy-dog eyes. “Please, for me? This is what I want. I’m in control, I’m thinking, _I’m_ the one making the choice this time, so it’s—fine, right? It’s fine.”

Grillby groans, then flings his hands in the air. _Alright! Oh, alright. We can_ try. _If you’re too frightened or in too much pain, though, I’m damn well getting a doctor and you’re damn well taking whatever they give you. Deal?_

“Deal. Now, I’ve taken some precautions to be sure you won’t be hurt. Obviously I don’t _want_ to hurt you, but I just don’t quite trust myself, and your health isn’t work risking at all. You know you’re very precious to me, and I would hate to make you feel unsafe in any way.” He pulls the muzzle from his inventory, dropping it onto the ground in front of Grillby. “So I’ll just put this on beforehand, and you can—”

Grillby reaches out to touch the muzzle, and it bursts into scorching red flames.

“Grillby!” Gaster cries out, valiantly attempting to throw snow over the muzzle without also searing Grillby. “Oh, you’re so _mean._ I worked very hard on that.”

 _I don’t care,_ Grillby hisses, folding his arms across his chest. The flames on the muzzle surge higher, heedless of the snow Gaster heaves over it. He groans in frustration, flopping rather dramatically down beside it. _I’m not going to_ muzzle _you, Wingdings. How dare you even ask me to do something like that._

“Then you don’t understand,” Gaster snaps. “Come on, you’ve seen how—how angry I get, and that’s when I’m in not in excruciating agony. When I’m not—fuck. Now I’ll have to build another one. You know how long that one took?”

_You’ll do nothing of the sort._

“Oh? You’re going to tell me what to do, now?” Gaster bristles. “You can’t back it up.”

Grillby sparks white at the edges, and Gaster scoffs and glances away. The heat around him surges as soon as he does, and he growls and whips his head around again. Grillby signs viciously at him, _I shouldn’t need to back it up. You should know better! You_ do _know better. God, you were horrified when the hospital told you to muzzle Papyrus._

“But I did it, because it was _safer_ for everyone involved. Papyrus is an infant, but he’s dangerous when he wants to be, and so am I. You’re just being deliberately obtuse.”

 _Call me stupid again, Wingdings Gaster_ —

“I’m not calling you stupid!”

_That’s exactly what you said, you just used bigger words!_

“Well you’re not stupid, so _there.”_

 _I know I’m not,_ Grillby says peevishly. _I don’t need you to tell me._

“I’m telling you anyway! I know you’re clever—far cleverer than people give you credit it for, goddamnit—but you’re not thinking clearly about this. Your emotions are clouding your judgement.”

 _I could say the same about you. You aren’t in the right mindset to make a decision like this. I’ll tell you the same thing I told you before—you aren’t emotionally_ ready _to shift._

“Well I don’t have time to wait around until everything is perfect! This form is _crippling_ me. A few hours of pain is worth the chance at a better life, a healthier life, a—” A longer life, for his boys. “It’s my body, and my life, so why don’t you let me decide?”

_Decide to what? Hurt yourself? Completely disregard your emotional needs? Make yourself feel unsafe, make yourself—_

“I _need_ to!”

 _No you don’t!_ Grillby bares his teeth, a flash of gleaming black Gaster rarely glimpses. _Perhaps you need to change for your own health. I’ll grant you that. But this is not the way to go about it, so go home, Wings. We’ll talk more reasonably about this later, once we’ve both calmed down._

“No,” Gaster says, his eyes narrowing sharply. “I’m doing this right now _,_ and I’ll do it with you or without you. I don’t have time to waste.”

_And why the hell not?_

“No reason I’d tell _you.”_

The air around him chills, suddenly. _...no,_ Grillby signs, his motions flat. _Of course not. Why would you tell me anything important?_

“Agh—that’s not what I meant.” He scrapes his paws over his head, frustrated. Wretched emotions, getting the best of him over and over and _over again!_ “That’s not how I meant it to sound.”

 _Just go home._ Smoke flickers around Grillby’s shoulders. _Go back to your family._

“I can’t. Grillby, please, I can’t.”

Grillby’s hands ball into fists—then, slowly, they uncurl. His shoulders sag. He turns on heel and marches back towards town. _I’ll see you tomorrow._

“Grillby, where are you going?” Gaster whirls around, digging his claws into the snow and looking desperately after his elemental. “You can’t just leave. You can’t—you—well, fine! Fine, just go back to your perfect family and your perfect life and your perfect emotional stability. See if I care.”

He cares. He cares very much.

His claws itch to tear something apart, but he slams his haunches to the ground and snaps his teeth at nothing, instead. His eyes burn. Fuck. _Fuck._ He shudders, and his spine throbs with agony. For the first time since his near-death in the forest, he suffers his pain and feels truly alone while he does. 

* * *

The sound of bony claws against a wall startles Sans from his afternoon nap. He groans and rolls onto his stomach, burying his head beneath a pillow. “Paps,” he murmurs. “Shhh. Stop.”

_Scritch. Scritch. Scritch._

“Papyruuuus, buddy.” He peeks out from underneath his pillow. Papyrus scrabbles his claws at the back wall with single-minded determination. “There’s nothing out there. You’ll literally just fall two stories and into the snow.”

Papyrus continues to scratch.

“Hey.” Sans sits up. “Papyrus.”

No response.

“Papyrus?”

Not even a tail-twitch.

“Pappy?” He frowns and sits up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. The second his feet hit the floor, Papyrus whirls around, snarling. There’s a distant, dazed look in his eyes—he blinks when he sees Sans, and the snarl fades. Sans lets out a soft breath. “...right. Okay. You back with me now?”

Papyrus sits down, tucking his tail around his legs and shuffling his front paws guiltily. His eyelights skitter away from Sans, never quite resting on his face.

“Hey, no, it’s okay.” Sans slides off of the bed to sit on the floor, opening his arms for Papyrus. Papyrus slinks towards him, head and tail low. “You’re allowed to not be okay, you know? That’s what Dr. Vanderpool always says—and Grillbz, and Dad, and Tori. If so many adults say it, they’ve got to be onto _something,_ right?”

Papyrus tentatively sets his chin on Sans’ shoulder. Slowly, giving his brother enough time to retreat, Sans wraps his arms around him and scratches beneath the crest of his skull. A shiver courses down Papyrus’ spine, but he doesn’t pull away. It’s another tiny victory.

“Wonder what Alphys is making for dinner,” Sans murmurs, rocking them both gently from side to side. Papyrus sighs sleepily. “Noodles, I bet. Seems like we always have noodles when she babysits. Hey, but I’m not complaining. Noodles are great. Bet you’ll like ‘em.”

Papyrus murmurs something incomprehensible and interspersed with clicks and warbles—but it’s one step closer to babbling, which is one step closer to talking. It sounds like Wingdings. Sans hugs Papyrus a little bit tighter, leaning their skulls together. 

Then he hears the door swing open downstairs.

“O-oh! Dr. Gaster, you’re back already,” Alphys says. Sans frowns, scooping Papyrus up and moving to sit next to the door. “Is something, um—is something wrong?”

“No,” Dad murmurs. “Something just—came up. Grillby had to reschedule. I’ll try again sometime soon. Where are the boys?”

“Upstairs napping. T-they’re perfectly fine. Are you—are you alright?”

“Yes. Perfectly fine, Dr. Alphys. Thank you.” 

He doesn’t sound fine. The two of them talk a while longer, and then Alphys slips out of the house again. That disappoints Sans some—he’d been looking forward to hanging out with her again (and to eating noodles, of course). He hears the familiar click of his father’s bones as he settles in downstairs, and he worries. Somehow, he doubts something as simple as rescheduling has returned his father to him.

A tad reluctantly, he sets Papyrus down. He pushes his door open, tip-toeing to the rail on the second floor and peering through it. Dad rests beneath him, head on the floor and paws over his muzzle. There are—

There are tears on his face.

Sans’ soul wrenches. “Daddy?”

Dad’s head snaps up, his eyes widening. “Sans. I thought you were asleep. I—” He lifts a paw, scrubbing furiously at his cheeks. “I’m sorry I woke you.”

Sans stumbles down the stairs, Papyrus following more slowly on his heels. He takes a seat next to his dad, leaning against his shoulder and wrapping an arm around his humerus. “It’s okay. Why are you sad? What happened?”

“I’m not sad.”

“Yeah, and I’m not stupid, and you’re not supposed to lie to me anymore.”

Dad lets out a shuddering breath, setting his head down again. Sans pulls his jacket off and uses it to wipe away the tear tracks that stick to Dad’s skull. “...it’s really nothing you can fix.”

“Maybe not, but that doesn’t mean you can’t talk to me about it. It’s okay to be upset. It’s okay if you’re—if you’re sad, or angry, or frustrated. If you bottle it all up inside, it just gets worse. Right?” That’s what everybody in the world seems to say, anyway.

Dad’s breath hitches, but he doesn’t offer Sans any further information. Sans sighs, crossing his legs and running a hand across Papyrus’ skull before continuing, “Listen, I’m five, so I know there’s not much I can do to really help you. If you’re expecting life-altering advice, you’re gonna be disappointed. All I can tell you is what other, smarter people have told me. It’s okay to have emotions. You just gotta deal with them in the right way. I thought that was what you were doing with Grillby?”

“...I was trying to, but Grillby didn’t agree,” Dad mumbles. He sounds rather petulant about it.

“Why not?”

Dad shrugs.

“You’re acting like a baby.”

He sniffs in offense. “I am not.”

“So what are you doing, sulking in here? You’re a grown-up. Go talk to him. Apologize, or tell him you want an apology, or neither, or both, I don’t care, but just laying here isn’t going to fix anything.”

Dad grumbles under his breath. Sans groans.

“Oooh my god—do I need to get Uncle Asgore?” he threatens. 

“No,” Dad says, shooting him a betrayed look. “I’m perfectly capable of handling this on my own.”

“Then go do it.” Sans stands up, pushing his dad’s haunches.

“What? Right now? I just got back—”

“Aaand you’re leaving again. Right now. Go talk to him.”

“I can’t leave you alone—”

“You’re going, like, three doors down. It’s _fine.”_

After half an hour of haranguing—Dad is far, far too stubborn, Sans thinks—he gets his father to slink back out of the house and towards Grillby’s. Papyrus sighs softly as the door swings shut.

“Yeah,” Sans says. “Tell me about it, buddy. And grown-ups think _we’re_ the ones with the problems.”

* * *

Gaster lays on the floor of Grillby’s back room, his tail between his legs, as Grillby goes about ripping him a metaphorical new one.

 _—never put a muzzle on you! I can’t believe you’d even ask me to do something like that. You’re my_ best friend. _Why the hell would I do that?_

“‘m dangerous,” Gaster says meekly, although he feels very distinctly Not Dangerous when he’s cowering at the feet of an infuriated elemental. Grillby had been cordial when he’d opened the door, but the second Gaster had tried to defend his point, he’d snapped into anger again. Gaster, for once, finds it difficult to return that anger. He already knows what good that does him. “I could hurt something, someone—”

 _I won’t let you, but I don’t need a goddamn_ muzzle _to do it. What, should I just shove you in a cage while we’re at it? Let you savage yourself instead of anyone else? Fuck!_

“No, I don’t—I—”

 _Besides,_ Grillby says, flames spitting with rage, _I don’t want you associating me with that bastard. He bound you, didn’t he? I won’t do the same._

“Never muzzled me,” Gaster mumbled. 

_Good. No one ever should._ Grillby folds his arms across his chest, scowling. When Gaster doesn’t respond, he hesitates. _...what’s wrong?_

Gaster shrugs.

_Oh, come on. Don’t be like that. Say what you mean to say._

“Why?” Gaster says, a touch sulky. “So you can talk over me again? So you can tell me I’m wrong and stupid and can’t make right choices?”

 _Hey._ Grillby sets a hand on his skull, his flames dying back some. _Hey, no, I—if I made you feel that way, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to._ He sighs softly, pushing his glasses up to rub the bridge of his nose. _I’m just—god, it upsets me to think about controlling you like that. To think about_ anyone _controlling you like that._

“‘s okay,” Gaster says. “I—get it, I guess. Kinda weird, after Jackson.”

 _Yeah._ Grillby sits down, leaning back against Gaster’s shoulder. _...talk to me? I’ll listen._

“I don’t want to hurt anyone,” he says, setting his skull on the floor and watching the shadows as they flicker. Well. Perhaps he wants to hurt one person. “I’m afraid that if I—if I’m in that much pain again, I won’t be able to help myself. I’ll hurt people indiscriminately. There could be nothing worse than that.”

Grillby lifts his hands, then lets them fall again. 

“To be the weapon I wanted to create so badly just a few years ago—” He laughs, wry. “It’s a kind of justice, isn’t it? But the point is, Grillby, this form _was_ designed to be a weapon, and a weapon it may very well be, if I’m not careful. Look, they wouldn’t even let Papyrus into the hospital without a muzzle. Papyrus! He doesn’t even weigh twenty pounds; what could he bite, a squirrel? If they see him as dangerous already, than how much more dangerous must I be? It isn’t worth the risk, not to me. A muzzle is a small price to pay for everyone’s safety and my peace of mind, is it not?”

_...you make a good argument._

“I know.” He sniffs, somewhat haughtily. “You ought to listen more often.”

 _But—but they have cause to think of Papyrus as a risk. He’s been trained to fight, hasn’t he? Conditioning like that is hard to break. You, though, Wings? Oh, pardon me for saying, but—_ Grillby elbows him gently in the ribs. _You’re a big softie._

Gaster tries his best to mime offense, rearing his head up. “Me? A softie? Did you see what I did to the mice in the basement last year?”

 _Yes,_ Grillby says, amusement coloring his flames yellow. _I do believe they’re living out their happy mouse lives after being quite humanely released in the forest._

“I killed one of them! Murdered!”

_You accidentally stepped on it._

“God, it was just awful. The poor thing—it wouldn’t stop screaming until I—until I—” He gulps. Oh, poor mouse.

_Yes, a true villain, you._

“Well. Well, perhaps I’ve not been conditioned into aggression, but that doesn’t mean I won’t feel it. I’ve been so angry lately—I don’t know what else has changed.”

 _What makes you so certain you’re going to hurt someone if you’re angry? And don’t tell me it’s just the form—Sans and Papyrus have the same form, and you’re not nearly so frightened of them. It isn’t that that makes you think you’re dangerous, not entirely, so_ what is it?

Gaster glances away. That’s...a little too perspective of Grillby, he thinks. The form _is_ a part of it, but—well, Grillby’s right. It isn’t the entire reason, and Gaster knows it well. He thinks he’s dangerous because he _is_ dangerous. He thinks he’s going to hurt people because there’s been a savage, sadistic sort of plan brewing in the back of his mind ever since he spared Jackson, and he—well.

He _likes_ it. 

He’s petrified of what that means for him, and for everyone around him, if he loses control. “I don’t know,” he says. “I really don’t know, Grillby, I’m sorry.”

Grillby exhales softly. _I suppose I can’t expect you to understand everything; I know this is confusing for you. Let’s...think about it a little longer, okay?_

Gaster winces. He doesn’t really have time to waste, at the moment. Every day he spends in this form is a day less he gets to spend with his boys. “I can’t wait long.”

_I know, I know. Just until after the Judgement, how about that? Once that’s over, you’re bound to be less stressed. The shift might be easier for you. In the meantime, I’ve got a lot of things to think about, even if you don’t._

“Ah.” Gaster looks guiltily at him. “I am sorry. I know this is taxing for you.”

 _It’s nothing more than I asked for. I appreciate that you felt comfortable enough coming to me, but there are some things—_ Grillby falters. _There are some things that perhaps I will not be able to do for you, Wings. Muzzling you may very well be one of them._

Gaster exhales softly. “I understand. And thank _you_ for telling me. Your emotions are as valuable as mine, you know? I’m glad you can stand up for them.”

 _Thank you._ Grillby flickers a golden smile at him. For a few minutes, the two of them sit together, listening to the fireplace crackling merrily. Then: _Wings?_

“Hm?”

_Talk to your therapist about this, would you? Ask their advice. You need to get used to doing that._

“Sir yes sir.”

Grillby elbows him playfully. 

* * *

The day of the Judgement, it snows hard and heavy. Gaster wakes up early and eats a light breakfast with his children. Sans is unusually somber; he knows what’s to occur today. He’d begged Gaster to let him attend for most of the previous evening, but Gaster had remained firm. A Judgement is no place for a child. Mature Sans may be (unfortunately so, in some respects), but he’s far from an adult, and Gaster isn’t going to treat him like one.

Papyrus also seems quiet, although Gaster thinks that has more to do with Sans’ mood than anything else. The pup is intimately attuned to the emotional shifts in the household, and this morning he moves more nervously around both Gaster and Sans, his head and tail low. He still walks stiffly, though his spine mends well; his first check-up appointment will be next week. Gaster is hoping to have Dr. Yeoman come on a house-call again. Papyrus simply isn’t ready for anything more than that, although starting physical therapy soon would be ideal.

...but all of that comes after the Judgement.

After breakfast, Gaster and his children head to Grillby’s. Grillby welcomes them all inside, and Sans slumps onto the couch in the backroom. Papyrus crawls beneath it. _It’s time, then?_ Grillby asks. He’d been rather irked when Gaster has selected him for babysitting duty, but the last thing Gaster wants is _Grillby_ at the Judgement. He can preach about emotional management all he likes—they both know the elemental would sear Jackson alive if he had half the chance, and Gaster simply can’t allow that. Jackson’s life belongs to _him._

“Yes, finally,” Gaster says, already looking towards the door. He’s impatient to begin—impatient to end, at last, this wretched chapter of his life. He dips his head, nudging Grillby affectionately before chirring at his boys. Sans glances over at him, and Papyrus’ eyelights peek out from beneath the couch. “Behave, you two. I love you.”

For the first time today, Sans’ morose expression softens. “Thanks,” he says. “We love you too, pops. Just—be careful, okay?”

Gaster inclines his head, and then he takes his leave. He breaks into a run as soon as he reaches the street, eating up the ground in great, loping strides. At least this damned enormous form is good for travel; the Riverperson waves as he bounds by. He’s half-tempted to simply teleport to the Judgement Hall, but it’s a waste of good magic. He won’t be late, at this rate, and running uses less energy than teleporting would. 

Even so, when he skids to a stop in the capital, his bones ache with the exercise—even a run, it seems, is far too taxing for him in his current...predicament. As he approaches the Palace, he smooths out his clothes: a simple yellow sweater and dark suit jacket from Thresh. It doesn’t replace his normal overcoat _(oh,_ he does dreadfully miss that overcoat), but it’s good to wear something; it’s good to feel like a monster instead of a beast.

Dogaressa checks him into the Hall, taking his signature and resting a soft paw on his elbow. “Are you alright?” she asks, her eyes earnest but serious. “You’re sure you want to be here for this?”

“I’m sure,” he says immediately. He has things to do here. He has promises to keep.

She squeezes his elbow. “Alright. If you need to step out—if you need anything at all—just let us know. You know we’d do anything for you, Dr. Gaster.”

“I know.” A smile flickers across his face—he is so lucky to have such friends—and he dips his head, brushing his nose across her forehead. “Thank you all very much.”

He signs his vow of silence—whatever happens here, it shall not be announced until Asgore decrees it—and then strides into the Hall to take his place in the crowd. Monsters from every town line the walls, kept carefully behind the columns. He feels their eyes on him as he enters, and he forces himself to hold his head high. He is not confident in many things, but in the decisions he makes today, he will not falter. He is right.

He _has_ to be right.

Several Guards patrol the edges of the Hall, preventing anyone from moving into the center; they’re allowed to watch and nothing more. Interference will be swiftly corrected. Even Asgore himself has been placed to the side—Gaster finds him and takes a seat next to him, and only then (only for his king, for his _friend)_ does he lower his head.

“Your Majesty,” he says respectfully.

“Wingdings.” Asgore leans against his foreleg, his face somber. He’s dressed in his battle armor—should the Judge prove unable to keep control of the criminal or crowd, he’ll be her backup (a rare thing indeed). “That’s a cute sweater.”

He rubs a paw over the chest of his sweater, humming. “You think? Thresh just finished it.”

“They’re very talented.”

“That they are, that they are. I’ve you to thank you for pointing me in their direction,” Gaster says. He’s tempted to lapse into silence when Asgore doesn't immediately respond, but that would give him too much time to think—the Hall almost feels festive with excitement, right now, buzzing with conversation and agitated movement. He’s not about to give that feeling up. (If he does, he fears he’ll be drowning in his anger again—or, worse, in his terror.) “It’s nice to be wearing clothes again.”

Asgore chuckles. “I can imagine. But really, Wingdings—how _are_ you?”

“I’m well enough. I’m excited for this to be over with.”

“Ah, that makes a good many of us.” He rubs Gaster’s forearm consolingly. “If you need to step out at any time—”

“I know, I know. You’re a bunch of sorry hens, you and your Guard.” He nudges Asgore, amused. “I’ll be fine. I’ve been waiting for this.”

“That’s precisely what I’m worried about.” Asgore sighs, rubbing his face. “Where are the boys?”

“At Grillby’s. There’s no way I would’ve brought them here—especially not Papyrus. If I have my way, he’ll never have to look that bastard in the face again.”

“See, now, there’s a good goal.”

“What? You don’t think my other goals are good?”

“I don’t know many of your other goals, little one. You’ve not exactly been forthcoming.”

“Well.” Gaster straightens up, curling his tail around his paws. The Guards pause for a moment near the front of the Hall, murmuring between each other before taking up their stations. The dogs’ hackles won’t quite lay flat. Ipera has a white-knuckled grip on her crossbow. “I’ll fix that soon, don’t worry. Now shhh—I think it’s starting.”

“It’s not a movie—”

“Asgore, shush shush shush be _quiet—_ we’re gonna miss the best part.”

The murmuring amidst the crowd falls silent as the double doors near the back of the Hall swing open. The Judge enters, her wings rustling dryly as she moves. She wears no armor, but—well. If what Gaster’s heard about her is true, he doubts she needs it, anyhow. When she reaches the center of the hall, she turns to face the same doors she had exited and sits back on her haunches, then offers the room a cursory glance. Upon spotting Gaster and Asgore, she inclines her head respectfully. Gaster (somewhat begrudgingly) returns the nod.

The Guards make their final sweep of the room, checking that the locks have been bolted and the crowd remains securely out of the way. Ipera takes her place in front of the Judge to announce the rules and rituals of the Hall, as well as to introduce the case. Dogaressa offers him a last sympathetic look, but he doesn’t mind it—in fact, he feels fit to burst with excitement. It’s time. It’s time, it’s time, it’s _finally time._

From the Judge, an order: “Enter the accused.”

The Dogi swing the doors at the back of the Hall open, and there Jackson stands. His hands are cuffed behind his back, and a Guard stands on either side of him. He looks whole. He looks healthy. He looks untraumatized. Gaster’s chest _burns,_ and his spines bristle along his back. Asgore rests a hand on his elbow, glancing up at him. Gaster refuses to meet his gaze.

Jackson’s eyes fall on the Judge, first. On the crowd, second. Then they snag on Gaster—of _course_ they do. They widen in disbelief, and then Jackson’s feathers slick down with fear, his wings clamping tightly against his back. He looks so much smaller, that way. He looks vulnerable. He looks like prey. 

Gaster shivers with excitement.

“You stand accused,” the Judge says, when Jackson stands before her, “of a multitude of crimes. The Kingdom has charged you with two hundred and sixteen counts of capital murder, two hundred and eighteen counts of child abuse, two hundred and nineteen counts of…”

Gaster leans forward as the Judge rattles off Jackson’s list of crimes. Her words are nothing but a blur to him; he knows Jackson’s crimes well enough. He is one of them. He flexes his claws against the floor, and they scrape gold away from the tile. Jackson’s breath hitches, his eyes darting towards Gaster, and a shudder of delight runs down Gaster’s spine to see the _terror_ there. Oh, but it does feel good to be on the other side of that fear, for once.

The crowd murmurs with disgust as the Judge finishes reciting Jackson’s crimes; a good many of them had had a general idea of what he’d done, but very few knew the specifics. They still don’t, Gaster thinks. They didn’t see the suffering. They didn’t see the warped mouths and leaking eyes and grotesque, twisted spines. They didn’t see the collars and the muzzles and the operating table with the dust-coated straps. They didn’t see the euthanizations. Their knowledge is reserved and clinical, at best—they can never know what Gaster knows how Gaster knows it.

The Judge then lists the attending evidence the Guard has so carefully collected over the past weeks, and Gaster has a moment to appreciate their hard work. Most of this Judgement has taken place behind the scenes, and he can’t imagine how many hours the Guard have spent trying to persuade Judge and jury of Jackson’s guilt (and most of that time spent while Gaster was hiding at Toriel’s like a wretched coward). He is so very grateful for them, he realizes. He’s so grateful he didn’t have to fight this battle all on his own.

Next, the Judge goes on to tell the crowd of her discussions with her jury, and then, at last, comes the moment they’ve all (and none more than Gaster) been waiting for. He shivers, and he can’t stop shivering. “For all these crimes,” the Judge says, spreading her wings, “I condemn you. You are guilty in all accounts. Your sentence is to be—”

Gaster leans so far forward that Doggo has to nudge him back. His soul burns within his chest, and barely-lashed emotion rattles through his bones. Black magic froths around his molars; he only notices when it splatters onto the floor and Asgore shoots him a look of alarm.

“—death at my claws,” the Judge finishes.

 _Yes,_ something poisonous and glad hisses in Gaster’s mind. _Yes, yes, yes, yes!_

“No,” Gaster says. All eyes swivel towards him, and he stands. Jackson stumbles a step back. “No, not at your claws, Judge.”

“Wingdings,” Asgore hisses. 

Asgore’s hand touches his arm again, but Gaster brushes him off. He steps forward, and the Guards let him, their eyes wide. “I claim my right,” he says, lowering his head to meet the Judge’s quiet gray eyes. “As the father of those slaughtered, in front of King and Judge, I claim my right.”

“Wingdings, _no,”_ Asgore snaps. “That is not something you want to—”

Gaster whips his head around, eyes burning. “It is my _right._ Do you deny me now?”

“I don’t—”

 _“Do you deny me now,_ Your Majesty?”

“Yes! Yes, I deny you.”

Gaster’s voice chills. “On what grounds?”

“Wing—”

 _“On what grounds_ do you deny me?”

Asgore trembles in front of him, hands balling into fists. “On the grounds that, on that—you—you can’t do this. It’s going to ruin you.”

Gaster scoffs, turning back to the Judge. “Weak grounds, sire. That you should deny me the justice I deserve because of your emotions—surely we can all agree that isn’t fair.” He peers closely at the Judge. “And what of you? Will you deny me my right, too?”

The Judge stays silent for a long moment. Behind her, Jackson shakes. “...no,” she says, finally, and Gaster feels dizzy with the victory.

“What?!” Jackson shouts, his wings flaring in alarm—it’s the first thing he’s said today, and the sound of his voice puts a horrible twist in Gaster’s soul. “You can’t give me to him, you can’t _do that,_ he’ll—”

Gaster snarls, whipping his head around. Stars, the smell of that bastard alone has Gaster shaking. The Judge steps between them before he can do anything too foolhardy, spreading her wings to block their view of each other.

“Enough,” she says, her voice hard. “Mr. Jackson, if you know what’s best for you, you’ll keep your silence and mind yourself right now. Dr. Gaster, as a Judge, I recognize your right.” She snakes her head closer to his, lowering her voice. “But as a sensible goddamn person? I tell you to listen to your king.”

Gaster draws his head back, morbid satisfaction welling in his chest. Asgore can deny him his right all he wants—if the Judge recognizes it, the king will have a hard time dissuading her. Personal feelings are not a matter of the court, and Asgore has no other grounds to stand on. Gaster knows this well. When the Judge folds her wings again, Jackson meets his eyes, and the fear in his face has Gaster preening with delight. 

“See you,” he says softly to Jackson, “in a few days.”

He turns and stalks back through the doors with Asgore on his heels. As soon as they’re outside of the palace, the king explodes. “What the hell are you _thinking?”_ he demands, slamming the end of his trident into the dust. Gaster doesn’t stop moving forward. “Wingdings! Wingdings, turn around and _talk_ to me, goddammit. I thought we were getting somewhere! I thought— _Wingdings Gaster,_ you listen to me right now—”

Gaster turns around, arching his neck to look down at his king. A dark, thick wave of hate crests in his chest—a wave that’s been building for months and months, a wave that knows only one end. He chokes it back down as best he can—not here, not yet. It isn’t meant for him, for this person in front of him, for this person who’s only ever wanted what’s best for him. “I don’t want to argue with you, Asgore.”

“Then stop being such a _fool,”_ Asgore says, his shoulders stiff. “I will not let you kill Jackson. Your soul is only beginning to heal—if you do this, you’ll—”

Gaster sways on his feet. Anger burns throughout his spine. His bones feel sore and shaky with the weight of his fury. “No, I don’t think—I really can’t argue about this right now. I have to go.”

“What? What do you mean you have to—”

“I mean if I stay here,” he hisses, clacking his teeth, “I’m going to do something I regret. We’ll talk about this later.”

Asgore opens his mouth, then shuts it and rubs his paws over his face. Gaster doesn’t wait for his response—he turns and bounds forward, away from King and Judge. He reaches Snowdin Forest before he loses it completely, and for that, he’s grateful. He staggers through the trees, his head low and tail lashing. His growls bubble and boil in his throat, and he tears his claws through the snow. Black magic spatters the ground beneath him, and he stumbles.

...his shoulders hurt.

He paces a line through the snow, his breath curling damply around his muzzle as he pants. He’s done it. He’s claimed his right. Asgore can try to thwart him, of course, but as long as the Judge agrees, it’s perfectly legal: he’s going to kill Jackson. Now, _how_ is he going to do it? Stars, he has so many _options._ A gun? A knife? Hanging? The Judge won’t deny him anything so simple; but that’s just the thing, isn’t it…? He doesn’t want _simple._ Jackson’s crimes are not _simple._ He wants something complex and cruel and twisted. The Judge won’t approve _that,_ of course. Cruel and unusual punishments are quite illegal, even for criminals—more’s the pity, Gaster thinks. If anyone deserves cruel and unusual, it’s Jackson.

It frightens him, thinking such sadistic thoughts. What on earth is he _becoming?_

Well. Well, it isn’t as though it matters, anyhow. All that matters is staying alive for his boys. Beyond that, he cares not. In fact, it’s because of them he _won’t_ torture Jackson the way he wants to. After all, if he did even a quarter of the things he _wanted_ to do to Jackson, the Guard would take Sans and Papyrus from him, and they’d be more than justified in doing it. Leaving children with someone that deranged, that out of control—

It simply isn’t safe. _(Gaster_ simply isn’t safe.)

...but Grillby promised, didn’t he? He promised to keep Gaster safe. He _promised._ Gaster won’t let him keep that promise, of course—not where Jackson is concerned—but perhaps, if Grillby is here, Gaster won’t feel so damnably afraid of all the anger choking him. He comes to a standstill, wavering on his paws as he fumbles to snag his phone with his magic. He sends Grillby a brief text, but he thinks that’s all he’ll need. Grillby just...has a way of being there when Gaster needs him, doesn’t he?

As he waits, Gaster turns his anger to a pair of sturdy oaks nearby. He splinters them between his teeth, razes them with his claws and growls in savage satisfaction as they crunch beneath his teeth and paws. It abates the awful energy in his bones some, but not nearly enough. He doesn’t think it will ever be enough. Actually—well, actually, killing _one specific person_ would be enough.

He digs a small boulder out of the snow, then wedges it between his teeth and _bites._ The pressure soothes his jaws, and he works them vigorously against the stone. Magic flickers and sparks between his ribs, but he chokes it down. He can’t afford to waste that, not even to soothe this hot, bitter feeling curdling through his bones.

 _Fuck damn it_ his shoulders hurt.

It’s Jackson’s fault. It’s Jackson’s fault he feels this way, isn’t it? It’s all that _motherfucker’s fault._ He’s the one who did this to Gaster. He’s the one who put him in this stupid, dysfunctional body, he’s the one who left Gaster with this pain, this anger, this _trauma._ God, Gaster deserves to kill him. It’s his goddamn right. How dare Asgore deny him that. And it isn’t as though Gaster is just doing this to make himself feel better, either! His children need him to do it. His children need their father to be strong, and if murdering Jackson is what he needs to do that—well, then, murdering Jackson is just what he’s going to do. He needs every ounce of soulmagic he can get, and if he can take it from someone who doesn’t deserve it and gain just a _few more years_ with his boys—

No king is going to deny him that.

A bolt of pain suddenly races from the nape of his neck to the tip of his tail, and he yowls and stumbles into a pair of trees. He expects the pain to end there, since it always comes in spastic waves. This time, however—this time, the pain is steady. Shit. He arches his back, lashing his tail as agony skitters along his spine and shoulders. His breath comes in choppy gasps, and he squeezes his eyes shut. Shit shit shit shit shit—

He hears the sound of bone snapping, and his eyes fly wide again. For a moment, he’s—

(—back in the solution, bone dissolving around him, bone growing in all the wrong places, bone snapping and cracking and _crunching,_ and he can do nothing but scream and beg for a mercy that never comes.)

A low snarl echoes in his chest, and he lurches forward, dragging his claws through the trunk of an innocent tree. It buckles beneath his weight, and he whirls around, hissing at the cold, empty air. When his pain still does not abate, he whips his head around, mouthing desperately at his own spine. There are cracks there—are they getting deeper? Is he falling apart? Holy shit, is he _dying?_

He staggers backwards, a choked whine in his throat. He can’t die, not yet, it’s not time yet—he was supposed to have more time with his family, his babies! He’s not ready yet, _he’s not ready he can’t he can’t he can’t—_

His whining snaps into a shriek of pain as another awful, splintering noise comes from his spine. His shoulders throb with agony, and his front legs buckle. He collapses into the snow, clawing at the frost in front of him. His vision blurs, red dots swarming in front of him. He gasps, his breath clogging around his muzzle. The air clings to his overheated bones, condensing and rolling down his ribs and skull. For a time, there is nothing but pain and terrible fear—

And then there is Grillby.

“Wings!” That voice—he barely recognizes that voice. It’s low and ragged, unused and uncertain, slurring around the edges. It’s a voice that doesn’t quite know how to shape itself. Gaster cracks an eye open in time to see Grillby drop to his knees beside him, hands flying up to sign. _What’s wrong? How can I help?_

“I don’t know,” he says—or, at least, tries to say. The words come warped and sticky from his throat, more growl than anything else, and he cannot seem to conjure his magic the way he needs to in order to sign back at Grillby. “I don’t know, I don’t, I—”

Pain jolts through him again, and he wails and bristles his spine in a useless attempt to ward it off. 

_Hey, hey, shhh, it’s okay,_ Grillby says—useless comfort though it is. It is _clearly_ very not okay. _We should get to a doctor, or I’ll—I’ll call someone, I’ll—_

He stumbles to a stop, suddenly.

“What?” Gaster asks, turning his head—but the twist of his neck quite heartily disagrees with him (as does the brace around his vertebrae), and he quickly snaps his head back into a more comfortable position. He drops his skull onto the snow, breathing quickly and heavily. “What is it? Grillby? What’s wrong?”

Grillby steps forward, moving to rest a hand on Gaster’s shoulder. Gaster cries out as he does, a miserable little puppy-noise of fear more than pain—but no hurt comes from the touch. The warmth soothes the constant ache in his bones, if only slightly, and he lets out a few choppy breaths of relief. _What is this?_ Grillby asks. He rubs his thumb across Gaster’s shoulder, but it doesn’t feel quite right. 

Gaster hazards another glance over his shoulder—he can’t look long before his spine protests again, but what he _does_ have time to see makes him flinch away. His bones are changing. In the center of each scapula, indenting his sweater, there’s a prominent bump, as though another arm is trying to form...another arm, or a…

...or a wing.

Oh shit. Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit—

Agony blazes through him again, and his shoulders creak—his wings grow a little further into the world, and then he cannot think through the pain and the fear. His thoughts muddle, crashing into each other like panicked birds, collapsing and decaying. He scrambles to his feet, and whatever Grillby says is lost to the sudden, high-pitched hum in his skull.

What the _fuck_ is happening to him? He’s done transforming! He’s done changing shape! He wasn’t ever supposed to do it again, not unless he was getting _smaller,_ getting more _normal,_ doing it _on his terms._ He certainly isn’t supposed to be getting worse. He can’t do this again. He can’t do this, he can’t handle, he can’t, he simply fucking _cannot,_ it absolutely is not a thing he can do. 

Suddenly, all he can think of is the solution, the shapeshifting, the cracking and splintering of bone and the swirls of blood floating around him. He can think of nothing but sterile tools and snide comments, yellow eyes and blistering, bursting _agony._ His fear is a hundredfold worse than his pain, and he quails at it, crouching and scraping his paws over his skull.

“Make it stop, please I can’t do it again _I can’t do this again,_ make it stop Grillby make it stop—I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t—”

Warm hands touch his muzzle, his face. “Shh,” Grillby says. “Shhh, hush, breathe. It’s alright. Open your eyes. Watch me.”

Gaster shakes his head. If he opens his eyes, he won’t see Grillby. He’ll see things far, far worse and he knows it. (He sees them even now, behind closed sockets, but how much _worse_ it will be when they don’t vanish in the daylight.)

“I am here. You are safe.” Grillby settles a palm against his cheek, smoothing his thumb back and forth. “I need you to look at me so I can talk to you. Be brave for me, won’t you? I know you are. You’re so brave, Wings. You can do this.”

Gaster makes a wretched, miserable sound, but he pries his eyes open to see Grillby’s hands as he speaks. He tries valiantly to ignore the flickers of shadows and feathers and screaming children that haunt the corners of his vision. He just needs to focus on Grillby’s hands, that’s all. That’s all there is.

 _You will be okay,_ Grillby says, crouching in front of him. _I will make sure you are okay. You are safe here, you are with me. No one is here who wants to hurt you._

“It still hurts!” It doesn’t matter that no one is here, _it fucking hurts anyway._ “It hurts please it hurts please make it stop hurting, please please please I don’t want to—”

 _Shhh, I know, I know._ Grillby’s face flickers with grief, and he leans his forehead against Gaster’s muzzle. _I know, my dear. I am so sorry it’s hurting you this way. I can go and get a doctor, and they’ll have medication to make it stop hurting, but I don’t want to leave you—nor do I think you’re in any position to walk back to town. I can call someone, but you’ll have to wait a while longer. Do you think you can manage that?_

Gaster moans in pain, his shoulders shaking—but he manages a miserable nod. “Just make it stop, make it stop hurting, I’m so _tired_ of it.”

Grillby stays near him as he calls the hospital, keeps a warm hand on his face, his neck, keeps him grounded. When he hangs up, he moves back to Gaster’s side, running his palms across Gaster’s shoulders. Gaster leans into his touch, breathing in shudders. 

_Does that help?_ Grillby asks.

Gaster nods weakly.

 _Good._ Grillby burns a little more warmly, stroking across Gaster’s shoulders and neck and spine. It eases his pain, albeit momentarily—then he moves the wrong way, and his bone cracks again and he’s back to making frightened animal noises and clawing the snow because he doesn’t want to change he doesn’t he doesn’t he doesn’t. _Wings, my dear, it’s alright. If it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen. Don’t be afraid._

“I don’t want it to happen,” Gaster says, fumbling to sign for Grillby. “I don’t want—I want to be normal, I don’t want this, I’m scared, I’m so sc-cared—”

_You don’t need to be scared. Everything is going to be alright. Just breathe, okay? In—come on, breathe in with me, that’s it—_

Gaster copies Grillby’s breathing as best he can, and it does soothe the panicked thrumming in his soul. Then another wave of pain courses through him, and he muffles his miserable whines in the snow.

 _Let it happen,_ Grillby coaxes. _I bet you’ll feel better once it’s over._

Gaster’s breath hitches. He feels so miserable, so helpless and stuck and _trapped,_ and he doesn’t have a choice and he’s hurting and it’s just like Jackson’s all _over_ again. Tiny shivers rack his body, and every bit of him feels sore and awful. Light glints _just the wrong way_ in the corner of his vision and he thinks of scalpels, of knives and bonesaws, and he flinches away. Grillby follows him, slow and steady, and sets his hands to Gaster’s shoulders again.

 _I know it’s frightening. I know it’s overwhelming and it feels awful and you don’t_ want _to feel it, not like this, not ever again,_ Grillby says, his flames crackling quietly. _And sometimes you’ll be able to fight it off. Most times you’ll be able to fight it off, eventually, but—sometimes you can’t. Sometimes the best you can do is breathe through it and survive, and that’s okay. That’s all you need to do right now._

Wise advice, perhaps, but advice that doesn’t quite make it through the pained, panicked flurry of Gaster’s thoughts. Perhaps it _would_ be more rational to simply let the change run its course, but he’s incapable of doing so. Maybe it will be easier in the future—maybe, one day, changing will be as normal to him as it is to Sans. Maybe one day he won’t fear feeling so trapped and helpless.

Today is not that day.

But Grillby sits with him, even as he struggles. He sits, and he runs his hands along Gaster’s aching bones, and he tells stories—silly stories from the bar, fonder stories from his home. His mere presence is a balm to Gaster’s savaged soul, and each time he’s racked with pain and his wings grow a little further into the world, he has Grillby’s strength to latch onto. Together, they make it through the worst of it.

Then, several minutes later, there’s a sharp, final crack as Gaster’s wings sprawl into existence. He shrieks in pain, clawing his own muzzle until Grillby eases his paws away with several soft, soothing crackles. And then—then, just as suddenly as it had started, the pain abates. He’s left with nothing but dull, aching soreness and a new set of limbs he has no _fucking_ clue how to use.

 _Well,_ Grillby says, stepping back and peering up at him. _Would you look at you? That’s a dragon if I’ve ever seen one._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: the foreshadowing for mr. dragon dings began in chapter eight and i am sO GLAD TO FINALLY GET TO POST ABOUT IT AAAAAAAAA—some of that chapter eight foreshadowing may also be helpful in regards to future events ;)


	29. lesson in recovery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to child abuse/neglect/violence, surgery, medical drug usage, thoughts of torture and death, self-loathing, stigma regarding psychiatric medications
> 
> [here](https://a-big-chicken-nerd.tumblr.com/post/613127207178633217/parsnipit) is some absolutely,,,stunning,,,art by @a-big-chicken-nerd,,,a;dlgkj;rnt;lnblkj
> 
> also!! we're in the final few arcs of the fic, so you know what that means !!!! iiiiiit's quote time again:
> 
> “In spite of the operation Charlie was still with me.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes
> 
> “Just leave me alone. I’m not myself. I’m falling apart, and I don’t want you here.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

“There,” Dr. Gabi says, stepping back and nodding in satisfaction. “That should feel better already.”

Gaster rolls his shoulders—the pain there has faded under her healing magic (and with the help of a few painkillers), so he sighs in relief. “Yes, it does, very much so. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. You know, when you said you were going to try and shapeshift, this wasn’t exactly what I was imagining,” she says, staring up at his wings.

“Yes, well. Me neither.”

_ All in good time.  _ Grillby sets a hand on his forearm.  _ But I think you’ve had more than enough for today. Let’s go home and rest—the boys will be missing you. _

“Would you like a ride back home, doctor?” Gaster asks, heaving himself to his feet. His forelegs tremble and he tips forward—his wings don’t weigh much in the grand scheme of things, but they make him damn well heavier than he’s used to. He fumbles to catch his balance, but his body hasn’t quite figured out to communicate with these odd new limbs yet, and his wings snap wide in a desperate attempt to keep himself upright. He bashes them against the encroaching trees and yelps, then twists around to push his wings back against his spine with his forepaws.

“...no, that’s quite alright,” Dr. Gabi says, hiding her smile behind her hand, her eyes twinkling. “I think you’ll be lucky to get yourself home without tripping. Do be careful, though. Your cervical vertebrae are still healing. Check them for any new fractures when you get home, and for god’s sake,  _ rest.  _ Doctor’s orders.”

Gaster flashes her a weary thumbs-up—well, as best he can with a paw, anyway. They head in separate directions; Gaster and Grillby trudge back towards Snowdin while Dr. Gabi follows her trail back towards Hotland. Shortly before they enter town, Gaster stops and lowers his head. His wings twitch—an unconscious, nervous gesture that sends a flicker of soreness through his back. Grillby stops, glancing back at him with an expression that says, quite clearly:  _ Well? Aren’t you coming? _

And of course he is. He would follow Grillby anywhere.

“It’s strange, isn’t it?” he asks. Grillby cocks his head. “The wings, I mean. I don’t know how I’m going to explain them. I don’t fully understand it, myself.”

_ You’re a dragon. _

“You think?”

_ I’ve never heard of a drake with wings. _

“But I’m a blaster. I’ve never seen a blaster with wings.”

_ How many blasters have you seen in your lifetime? _

“...too many.”

Grillby winces.  _ I’m sorry. I mean—how many  _ adult  _ blasters? Dragons don’t grow their wings in until they’re adults, after all. _

“Somehow, I don’t think it’s quite as simple as that. The blasters I use with my magic don’t have wings, and they’re adults. So why is it only me? Was it something Jackson did? Was it something  _ I  _ messed up in the initial genetic code?” He sighs softly, his head drooping. “I don’t want any more of these mysteries, these changes. I just want to go home.”

_ Then let’s go. _

“It won’t feel like home.”

Grillby’s shoulders slump.  _ Ah, Wings.  _ He trudges back through the snow, reaching up to rest a hand on Gaster’s snout.  _ I know you want what was, but that’s gone now, and there’s no getting it back. _

Grief quakes in Gaster’s chest. 

_ But if you move forward, I think, maybe, you’ll find that you can make something just as good as what you had before—maybe even something a little bit better.  _

“I don’t want anything better. I was happy. I was the happiest I’ve ever been.”

_ And you will be happy again. I know change is frightening, but you can’t stop it—not anymore than you could stop this.  _ He gestures at Gaster’s wings, and Gaster is reminded quite sharply of how very  _ helpless  _ he is in this world.  _ You can’t stop it. You have to move through it. Things will be alright, you’ll see. _

Grillby turns, striding away from him. 

Gaster whines unhappily, shuffling his paws. 

_ Come on,  _ Grillby says, flashing him a frown.  _ Stop moping. Let’s go. _

Gaster whines more.

Grillby puts his hands on his hips.  _ Wingdings Gaster, that’s enough of that. I know you’re miserable, but you’ve had enough wallowing for the day. We’re going home, and we’re resting and we’re eating dinner and we’re watching our children play and we’re having a good night. Now, you can come along with me or you can sit and drown in self-pity for a few more hours. Which would you prefer? _

Gaster sighs—but he gets up, and he limps home on his elemental’s heels.

The second they reach the house, Sans bursts through the door. “Dad! Where  _ were  _ you?” he demands, glaring. “You can’t just disappear like that. We were  _ worried.  _ We—”

He stops, suddenly, when he catches sight of Gaster’s wings.

“It’s a long story,” Gaster says apologetically, cocking his head and looking uncertainly at the house. He was lucky enough not to destroy anything  _ too  _ valuable with his tail—he doubts the same will be said for his wings, if he even manages to fit through the doorway. “I am sorry for worrying you, though.”

“Forget that, what are  _ those?”  _ Sans gestures wildly at his wings. “Are you—you—what?  _ What?” _

Gaster gently nudges him backwards, clamping his wings as tightly as he can to his sides before squeezing into the house. He has to scrabble with his claws to move forward, and he leaves gouges on the doorframe, but he makes it in. Of course, once he’s in he can’t do anything more than curl up in the living room and sit as still as possible—but it’s better than being left outside in the damp and the cold.

_ Your father is a dragon,  _ Grillby explains, stepping in after him and stamping the snow from his boots.

Sans screeches.

After a long, harried explanation (most of which is  _ I don’t know _ s), Sans scrambles onto Gaster’s back and prods one wing. Gaster, very tensely, lets him. He’s afraid to move too much, lest he startle his wings into jerking and knocking Sans from his back—or knocking holes into the walls. “That’s so  _ weird.  _ Actually, scratch that, everything about your life is weird. I don’t know why I’m surprised anymore, _ ”  _ he says, tracing his fingers along one fine wing-bone. 

“Me neither,” Gaster admits rather wryly.

“Oh! So that means these are fin bones, right?” He points at Gaster’s tail, at the thin spikes on either side of the tip. “For steering? If you, uh, could actually fly—or actually had wings or, like, anything but bones.”

_ Precisely,  _ Grillby says. He has the nerve to look delighted, clasping his hands in front of his chest.  _ I thought they were simply a defense mechanism, but this makes much more sense. _

Gaster fans his tail-spikes, humming discontentedly. 

“Do they hurt?” Sans asks.

“They’re only a little sore,” Gaster says, resting his head on the couch. Papyrus squirms out from underneath it to peek uncertainly at him, eyes flicking up to his wings before they dart back to his skull. “Dr. Gabi came along and had a look at me, and I’m in sound health.”

...well. As sound as he’s been since Jackson, anyhow. 

“So is it natural or is it something Jackson made you have?” There’s a dark, unhappy tone to Sans’ voice when he asks, and Gaster twists his head around (slowly, so as not to irritate his cervical vertebrae any more) and nudges him gently. 

“I don’t know, little one.”

“Will you ever?”

“Well—well, I suppose I will if  _ you  _ grow wings in a few years,” he says.

“When I  _ what?!” _

Gaster laughs, batting a paw playfully at Sans when his son slides off of his back. “That’s what Grillby says—tell him about dragons, Grillby, won’t you?”

_ Dragons grow their wings in when they’re adults,  _ Grillby explains, to Sans’ rapt attention.  _ Now, I don’t know everything about them. I’ve certainly never met one, so all my knowledge is hear-say at best. We’ll need to do more research before we— _

He stops, suddenly, snapping his mouth shut and clearing his throat.

“Grillby?” Gaster says, nudging his shoulder. 

_ Ah, nothing. Sorry. I  _ would  _ like to research a little bit more, and soon, but I can tell you what our folktales told me.  _ He settles back on the couch, cupping his palms in his lap. Above them flickers a spark, and that spark quickly morphs itself into the shape of a lithe purple dragon.  _ A long, long time ago, there were dragons… _

Sans and Gaster both listen intently as Grillby speaks. He tells them of dragons, of their pacts with elementals, of their place in the war. He tells them of awful experiments and noble revolutions. He tells them about Iskierka and Arkady. Gaster dozes there, eventually, his head next to Grillby and his head full of fanatical, impossible stories. When he wakes, it’s to a knock at the door. He jerks his head up, already tense, but Grillby waves him off and slips from the kitchen (the kitchen? hopefully that means  _ dinner)  _ to answer the door himself. Outside stands one very unhappy King Asgore.

“Wingdings,” he says, his voice low and firm. “I’ll speak with you outside.”

Grillby flickers him an uncertain glance, as does Sans. Warily, Gaster forces himself to his feet and crams himself back outside—when Asgore catches sight of those damnable wings, he gapes. “What,” he says, “the fuck.”

Gaster winces, shuffling his paws and crouching before his king. Now that his anger has faded, he feels every bit guilty about how he acted at the Judgement—although he’s still quite convinced he’s in the right. He only wishes he hadn’t caused Asgore such shame and worry. It’s becoming a painfully familiar regret. “I don’t know,” he says. “I’ve truly no idea. It just happened.”

“It just happened,” Asgore breathes in disbelief.

“Yes. I mean—well, I mean, my shoulders have been hurting for a—a while, but—”

“How long.”

“What?”

“How long have they been hurting, Wingdings.”

Gaster stares miserably at his paws. “...ever since Jackson.”

Asgore’s hands ball into fists. He takes a deep, trembling breath. When Gaster hazards a glance back up at him, he’s startled to find tears in Asgore’s eyes. “I cannot believe you,” he says, his voice ragged. “Over and over and  _ over  _ again, what do I tell you? If you’re hurting, if you need help, you  _ tell someone.  _ You don’t suffer it alone. And over and over and  _ over  _ again, what do you do?”

Gaster couldn’t possibly shrink any further into the snow. He’s about two seconds from groveling.

“Nothing I do ever gets through that thick skull of yours, does it?” Asgore lifts his chin sharply. Tears streak the fur on his cheeks, but Gaster can smell his anger, stinging and sharp. “What is it? Do you not trust me?”

“No—no, please, it isn’t you,” Gaster says, inching forward and nudging Asgore’s hands. Asgore jerks away from him, his eyes narrowing sharply, and Gaster sets his head on the snow and lays very still, instead. “It’s me, it’s my fault, it’s—”

“I know it’s your fault—your fault and the fault of anyone who had a hand in raising you. Stars, I want to help you get better, but I can’t do it if you aren’t willing to  _ try.” _

“I have tried! I’ve tried, I’ve been better, Asgore, please—” His voice cracks. “Please I’ve been better. Don’t give up on me, not now, please not now.”

Asgore exhales, his breath curling around his mouth. The lights above gleam dully on his horns as he bows his head. “You have tried,” he agrees, finally. “I know you have. I shouldn’t have insinuated otherwise. And I know it’s harder for you now, but you cannot keep sliding backwards. I will not allow that.”

“I won’t, I won’t,” Gaster swears. “Just don’t—don’t—”

_ Don’t leave.  _ It’s an old, old fear—an injury never fully healed, and one made all the more vulnerable by the awful events of the last couple of months.

Asgore rubs his eyes. “I’m not going anywhere, although god knows I’m useless enough here, since you won’t  _ work  _ with me. You didn’t tell me about wanting to kill Jackson, either.”

Gaster glances back at the house, lowers his voice. That’s nothing his children or Grillby need to hear about. “I knew you wouldn’t like it.”

“And you couldn’t  _ talk  _ to me about it? You had to say it in front of the Judge, in front of everyone? Do you know how humiliating that was for me? To have my authority challenged in front of so many people? To be pitted against the Judge herself?”

Gaster winces. “I—didn’t think you would react so strongly.”

“You thought I’d  _ let  _ you do it?”

“Well, I didn’t think you’d be pleased, but I didn’t think you’d say  _ no— _ at least not in front of everyone like that. I expected you to bitch at me  _ after  _ the Judgement.”

“Here I am, then, doing my bitching duty.” Asgore puts his hands on his hips, scowling.  _ “No.” _

“Asgore—”

“No. Absolutely not. You are not putting a single claw on that bastard.”

“Put a pin in it.”

“What?”

“We’re putting a pin in it,” Gaster says decisively. “It means we’re going to come back to this later.”

“We are  _ not  _ going to—”

“Neither one of us is thinking clearly at the moment. You’re upset, and I’m fairly certain I’m high on whatever painkillers Dr. Gabi gave me. Let’s just think about it for a little while before we go making any rash decisions.”

He hopes beyond hope that he doesn’t have to go behind Asgore’s back in this—that would make him feel  _ awful.  _ If he can just take a few more weeks to work on Asgore’s state of mind, to convince the king that this  _ has  _ to happen, everything will be easier. Keeping Asgore happy with him is worth a little more time—especially if he can use that time to work on shifting back to his regular form, too. Killing Jackson isn’t an quite as pressing of a matter, time-wise, although he would like to do it soon. 

But one way or another, Gaster’s going to have what’s owed him.

“There is nothing you are going to say to change my mind. You’re wasting your time,” Asgore says, folding his arms across his chest.

“Okay,” Gaster says. He can be patient, just  _ watch _ . If there’s one thing he’s learned by raising a toddler, it’s that. “So, uh—you wanna come in for dinner? I can explain the wings. Or, er. Grillbz can probably do that better than me, actually.”

Asgore offers him one last scathing look, and then he comes in for dinner. Grillby has gone above and beyond, as per usual—they’re treated to fruit salad, stir fried rice, and good conversation. For a few minutes, as they eat and talk around the table, Gaster can pretend that everything is normal and safe and good. 

...then he glimpses Papyrus out of the corner of his eye, cowering beneath the couch.

His chest aches.

* * *

“I want to change,” he tells Dr. Willow at his very next therapy appointment. 

“Change?”

“Yes. I don’t want to be in this form any longer.” He studies his claws unhappily. “Genetically, physically, it should be possible—I’ve seen the data.”

“So why haven’t you changed, already?”

“You could wager a guess.”

“I want you to tell me.”

“I’m afraid,” he admits, the words bitter between his teeth.

“What are you afraid of?”

“Everything.” He sets his head on the couch, closing his eyes. “Everything, all the time.”

Dr. Willow clicks their pen, sitting back in their chair. “It must be painful, living that way. I can teach you techniques to manage your fear, but if you’re suffering this much now, I think you could benefit from medication—at least until we get your anxiety under control.”

Gaster cracks an eye open to regard them wearily. “I don’t want to rely on that. I need to learn to cope with my fear, not drug it out of existence.”

“That sounds like stigma talking, Dr. Gaster.” They waggle their pen at him. “If you need help controlling your fear, you need help, and that’s that. Taking medication doesn’t mean you’re a coward. It means that you need help bringing your emotions down to a manageable level so you can learn to cope with them—think of the medication like training wheels. You didn’t begrudge it when Dr. Vanderpool talked about giving Papyrus medication, now, did you?”

“No, but he’s been through so much, and he’s so little—he needs  _ some  _ kind of help. I should know better. I’m an adult, I ought to be capable of coping by now.”

“You are perfectly capable of coping, but you don’t know how yet, and so you’re not. You know you’re not, or you wouldn’t be here.”

He flicks his tail disconsolately.

“It is my job to teach you to cope, and I will do that. However, it is also my job to ensure that you feel safe throughout the process—medication will help. I’m not saying it’s going to be a permanent thing, but you’re clearly distressed right now, and you know as well as I do that learning to cope is going to be a lot easier for you if you aren’t under constant duress. Think about it, won’t you?”

“...I’ll consider it,” he says, “but anxiety medication takes weeks to become effective. I need to change soon. Within the month, ideally.”

“Alright, well, what are your options?”

“Options?”

“Yes.” They wave a hand at him. “How does the change work?”

“Er—well, part of it’s genetic. With the boys, their magic reactivates their hominid phenotype and makes their forms malleable. From what I’ve garnered from Sans, he just  _ wills  _ it to happen and it does, sort of like lifting an arm. It’s...not been so easy for me.”

“Is there any other way you could trigger it?”

He thinks of his anger, of the ache along his back, and grimaces. “Strong emotions seem to do the trick, but I’d rather avoid that, if I can. It...upsets other people.”

“Alright. Could someone design something to trigger it?”

“What, like a chemical?”

“Sure. I know it might be a bit of a stretch, but you managed to reconfigure your entire genotype to create a creature capable of changing forms at will, so I think it’s possible.”

Gaster laughs. “Stars, it took me  _ years  _ to figure that out. I have more data now, but I—I don’t know. I’d have to look through the papers, I’d…”

“Not you. Have someone else do it.”

“No.” Gaster’s voice chills. “No one else needs to see those papers.”

“Pick someone who’s already seen them.”

“No one else has—oh.”

Dr. Willow arches an eyebrow.

“I mean, I suppose Dr. Alphys has. I could see if she has any ideas, although genetics aren’t her forte. Using a chemical to initiate the shift, though—” An uncomfortable shiver rattles his bones, and his wings twitch. “That’s exactly what Jackson did. It sounds very—very unpleasant.”

“Could you be sedated for the procedure?”

“Sedated?” Gaster huffs, bitterly amused. “How about I just learn to quit being such a coward and change the way Sans does? How about that?”

“That isn’t going to happen in a few weeks.”

“Because I’m incapable of—”

“Because you’re  _ traumatized.  _ Yes, you’re afraid, and you have every right to be. What happened was horribly scary and horribly painful. No doubt your body wants to avoid going through that again with everything it has. You’d be lucky to get through a shift without a full-blown flashback.”

“Then I’ll  _ have  _ a flashback! Who cares? I just want to—”

_ “You  _ should care,” Dr. Willow says fiercely, jabbing their pen at him. “That’s your first lesson in recovery, doctor. You need to care about how you feel. No, you won’t be able to avoid unpleasant things all the time, but you can certainly avoid triggering yourself like this. What? You want to endure it just so you can prove you’re brave? So you can prove you’ve had some sort of  _ character development  _ throughout all of this?”

“Well—well I should be brave, I should—”

“This isn’t bravery, it’s foolishness and desperation. The best option here is for you to wait and learn a few more coping skills before you try another shift. Since you’re dead-set against that, though, the next best thing is for you to endure the shift with as little pain and fear as possible. If that requires sedation, then so be it.”

“Well I’m afraid of that too!” He stands up, pacing a cramped circle around the couch and clicking his lower jaw unhappily. “I’m afraid of—of letting someone sedate me, of letting them inject me with chemicals, of being treated like some kind of  _ experiment  _ all over again.”

“I know. There is no perfect option here, if you’re not willing to give it time.”

Gaster sits, blowing out a frustrated breath. 

“Valium,” Dr. Willow decides, after a moment. “I could give you valium before they sedate you, that way you’re already calm. You’d go to sleep with the sedation, and when you woke up, you wouldn’t even be in the lab any longer. We can talk to the hospital and see if they’ll make the operating room and recovery room as non-clinical as possible. We’ll see to it that you get to talk to the doctors working on you well beforehand, so you can address any concerns you have with them. I will work with you to make this ordeal as peaceful as I can, but you have to work with me, too. Is this something you’re willing to try?”

“...let me think about it.”

“Very well. You’ve got a lot to think about this week, Dr. Gaster.”

“Yes.” He sighs wearily. “I certainly do.”

“Now, then. Let’s discuss some effective decision-making skills, so you don’t stress yourself out too badly…”

* * *

“Grillby? Whatever are you doing out here?” Gaster peers around the back of the bar, his tail flicking behind his heels. Grillby seems to be rummaging through the bar’s back room, and dusty boxes litter the snow around him. Sans slides off of Gaster’s back and bounds forward, followed closely by Papyrus. Grillby startles when they swarm around his legs, but he quickly settles and glances in Gaster’s direction. Gaster repeats his question, signing along.

_ Oh—I was looking for some books,  _ Grillby says. He peers around himself, sighing out a breath of gray smoke.  _ I can’t seem to find them, but I know I must have them around here somewhere. _

“What books are they?” Sans asks, his eyes bright. “We can help you look.”

_ They’re old things—I doubt they even have titles on them. They’re leather-bound, brown, probably disintegrating as we speak. _

“What are they about?”

_ Dragons,  _ Grillby says, a sly grin on his face. Gaster snorts, laying down in the snow.  _ They were passed down from my parents, and from their parents, and their parents before them, so they’re very delicate. Do be gentle if you find them. _

Sans flashes a thumbs-up, then gets to rummaging through boxes.

_ Was there a particular reason you came by?  _ Grillby asks, dusting his hands off and moving towards Gaster.

“Oh, no. We were on our way to the library, and Sans wanted to say hello.”

_ Only Sans, hm? _

“Well, I suppose I did, too,” Gaster says, flickering a shy smile. “Hello, Grillby. How are you?”

_ I’m very well. How are you? _

“Good,” Gaster says, and he actually means it. Today has been slow and calm and kind, as far as he’s concerned. He has dinner scheduled with Asgore later, however, and he’s got the feeling that won’t be a pleasant end to the day. No doubt they’ll end up bickering about Jackson’s fate again. Ah, well. It has to happen. Gaster is going to get his way—he just has to wear Asgore down first. “I spoke with Alphys yesterday.”

_ And? _

“She says it might be possible to synthesize a chemical to trigger a shift. I’ve allowed her very limited access to what’s left of Jackson’s data, and she has a sample of my own DNA.”

_ I’m impressed. _

“I don’t trust her.”

_ I know. That’s why I’m impressed. _

“I’m keeping a close eye. So is the Guard.”

_ Good. As it should be. That data is dangerous, and I can’t wait until you’ve destroyed the rest of it. _

“Me neither.” Gaster crosses his paws, yawning. “Soon, soon. They don’t need it now that they’ve judged Jackson, anyhow. If I don’t get to destroy it by the end of the month, I’ll complain.”

_ Please do. _

“Anyhow, provided she can figure something out, I—I think I’m going to go through with it the way Dr. Willow suggested.”

_ Ah.  _ Grillby sits down next to him.  _ That would be best, I think. If you can avoid feeling pointless fear and pain, then by all means, do. I don’t want you to suffer merely to prove you’re brave—and besides, I imagine even letting them sedate you is frightening enough. _

“It’s like Mufasa says, Dad,” Sans points out, poking his head out of an oversized box, “‘I’m only brave when I have to be. Being brave doesn’t mean you go looking for trouble.’”

_ Ah, Mufasa,  _ Grillby says, nodding sagely.  _ A wise lion if ever there was one. _

“Mufasa?”

“Yeah, you know? From  _ The Lion King?  _ We watched it yesterday?”

“Oh. I must have been distracted.” Gaster smiles sheepishly. “Sorry.”

Sans groans and plunges back into the box, digging out several feather boas Gaster is quite curious about the origins of. 

_ All that to say, I think enduring a change right now would cause pointless trauma on top of what you’re already dealing with. Of course, if it must be done to preserve your health, than by all means, do it—but do it as gently as possible. Sedation sounds marvelous. You’ll only have to fret for a few hours, and then you’re unconscious and then you’re back to normal. It sounds like a wonderful way to go, compared to all of your other options. _

“Ah—thank you, Grillby. That does make me feel better.”

_ Good.  _ Grillby bumps their shoulders together.  _ Don’t feel bad about doing things to make your life easier. It’s alright to  _ not  _ want to feel pain and fear, you know? _

“Speaking of, I also discussed anxiety medication with Dr. Willow,” Gaster admits. “But—oh, I’d just feel so bad, taking something like that. I’m not  _ that  _ poorly off, and I should know how to deal with this without chemically smothering my emotions.”

_ That’s hardly what anxiety medication is for and you know it. You’re not upset because you have to take antibiotics, are you? _

“No, I suppose not.”

_ Exactly. Antibiotics heal physical wounds. Anxiety medication helps heal mental ones. There’s no shame in that. _

“You wouldn’t think me cowardly, then?”

_ I have never thought you cowardly,  _ Grillby says firmly.  _ You have done cowardly things, but you have never been a coward in my eyes, and I doubt you ever will be. As a matter of fact, I think what you’re doing now is very brave of you. It takes a lot of courage to admit something’s wrong and to seek help for it. _

“You think?” Gaster’s face feels warm, and his soul light.

_ I do.  _ Grillby leans against him.  _ You are very brave, my dear. _

“Hey, look at this,” Sans calls. Gaster and Grillby both glance over—he’s standing in front of an ancient BBQ grill, his eyes wide. “What is it?”

_ That’s a grill,  _ Grillby says.  _ One of my very first. _

“Can you use it?”

_ I suppose I can. Would you three like to stay for lunch? I can fire it up and we can have burgers. _

“Burgers!” Sans cheers, and that’s that. Grillby gets to work cooking, and within the half-hour the air smells heavily of charcoal and smoke and delicious BBQ. Fuku gets home from school just in time to join them, and they all gather in the back room of the bar and eat and talk and laugh. Fuku discovers the boxes outside, and she’s quick to start dressing up in the feather boas. Sans giggles and joins her, but Papyrus—

Well, Papyrus doesn’t seem fond of the feathers. Gaster can’t blame him. 

_ Look!  _ Fuku exclaims, twirling around—she’s found a puffy black dress to wear over her hoodie and jeans, and the hem swirls around her feet. Gaster isn’t expecting the heartbroken look that flickers across Grillby’s face when he sees her, but the elemental is quick to shake it off and smile warmly at her, instead.  _ What do you think? _

_ You look just like your mother. _

_ Only green! _

_ Only green,  _ Grillby agrees fondly. As the children turn back to their boxes, he sits back and exhales. The smoke that curls from his mouth is black and bleak. 

“Hey.” Gaster nudges him gently. “I’m sorry. I know you miss Pyre.”

_ Always.  _ He rubs the heel of his hand over his sternum—over his soul.  _ I wish she could have seen Fuku grow up. She’d be so proud of her. _

“She would be proud of both of you.”

_ You think? _

“Of course I do. Grillby, you’re wonderful. You’ve patient and honest and brave and an absolutely phenomenal father, and you’re so good at telling stories, and you’re the best chef in the Underground and you give the great advice and you make everyone feel heard and loved and—” He notices Grillby flickering pink, and he stops himself, his own face warm. “And you’re really, um. Really cool. She’d be proud of you.”

Grillby closes his eyes, a smile flickering across his face.  _ I hope you’re right. _

“And I’m proud of you, too.”

His smile grows a little bit wider.  _ Thank you, dear. You know, when I fell in love with her, it was so fast. If there was ever such a thing as love at first sight… _

“I’m sorry you had to lose her.”

_ Me too. Nothing will ever feel quite right again.  _ He holds his hand out, studies the gaps between his fingers.  _ I will never feel entirely whole. For a long time, I thought I was irreparably damaged. I thought I’d never love someone as much as I loved her. _

Gaster hesitates, then asks, “...and now?”

_ And now I have Fuku, and I have Sans and Papyrus, and I have you. My life is full of love.  _ He crackles a joyful grin.  _ Whole or not, I am happy. _

Gaster purrs his delight at Grillby, butting his head against him and receiving several chin-scritches for his efforts. 

After lunch, Grillby helps him dab antibiotic ointment across the healing cracks on his neck, then binds them and splints them again. Gaster gathers his children and they make their way to the library. Papyrus huddles under the chairs as Sans and Gaster read—Gaster lays outside, snaking his head through the window, because he’s much too nervous about his wings knocking over the shelves to dare squish himself inside. Once they’ve spent a few hours at the library, they head back home, and Asgore arrives for dinner. They eat, and then, while the boys watch cartoons in the living room, Gaster and Asgore head upstairs to argue.

“Well,  _ I’m  _ still saying no,” Asgore says, his hands on his hips. He looks like Toriel, when he does that.

“I know you only want what’s best for me,” Gaster says as placatingly as he can. “I appreciate that, but you need to allow  _ me  _ to make this decision. It isn’t made out of irrational anger. It’s—”

“Cold, calculated murder.”

“—simply something I need to do. The boys need more magic.  _ I  _ need more magic so I can provide for them. The easiest way to get that magic is by killing Jackson.” He hasn’t mentioned that he’ll die in three years without this. He doesn’t want to, if he doesn’t have to. If he can only kill Jackson, he’ll gain a few more years, and he need not worry anyone yet. Oh, Asgore would scold him for that thinking, and Gaster knows it—but try as he might, he simply can’t force the words from his mouth:  _ Asgore, I’m dying.  _

His chest feels cold. He can’t do it.

“And with that magic, you will gain a guilty conscience,” Asgore points out.

“I already have that.”

“Well, stop it. That guilt is needless. What happened to Sans and Papyrus wasn’t your fault. What happened to  _ any  _ of those babies wasn’t your fault. But if you murder Jackson, you’ll deserve your guilt, and not a thing in the world will keep it from you.”

“I don’t care. Guilt is a small price to pay for my boys’ health—and mine.”

“Damn it, Wingdings! Killing someone isn’t something to be taken lightly,” Asgore hisses, his eyes blazing in shades of blue and yellow. “I of all people would know what it’s like to slaughter someone, to feel that  _ blood  _ on your hands for years and years and years. It taints you. It ruins you.”

Oh. Oh, that’s what this is about. “Asgore…”

“Don’t pity me,” Asgore spits, tearing his eyes away from Gaster. “I can’t stand it.”

“I’m sorry you feel so badly. Killing those humans—it was something you had to do. You know that, right?”

Asgore’s hands shake.

“Sometimes death can’t be avoided. It’s okay.” Gaster reaches out with a paw, drawing Asgore to him. The king leans his head against Gaster’s chest, shoulders trembling and face set in anger—then, after a moment, he begins to crumple. He sags more heavily against Gaster, reaching up and resting his hands against his sternum. “You did what you had to do to protect us. You saved so many people, and one day—one day you’re going to free us all. I know you are. And I’m proud of you! I’m grateful for what you’ve done, for all you’ve sacrificed. I couldn’t ask more of any king, any  _ friend. _ So—don’t feel guilty, alright?”

“I cannot stop.” Asgore’s voice cracks. “It doesn’t  _ stop,  _ Wingdings. It rots you. You can justify it all you like, but killing another person is, it’s—it’s a hideous thing.”

Gaster makes a soft, sad sound and bows his head. He brushes his muzzle against Asgore’s horns. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I wish it didn’t hurt you so.”

“But it gets easier. If you kill once, it gets easier.” Asgore rubs his eyes, taking a shaky breath. “And it’s so frightening, so horrible. It feels  _ evil.  _ I don’t want that for you.”

Gaster glances away, guilt tearing at him. Stars, he hates upsetting Asgore like this. But it just—it just has to be done! For his children, for his  _ children.  _ “I’ll only do it once,” he says, trying to keep his voice firm and resolute. “Just this one time, Asgore. No more.”

Asgore trembles, and for a moment, Gaster thinks he’s won. Then: “No. Absolutely not.”

Gaster sighs, but he leaves the bickering at bay for now. Asgore’s clearly too stressed to argue any further. “Hey,” he says, nuzzling Asgore’s face gently. “About this, uh, guilt thing—I know a good therapist. I could set you up for a consult, they could get you more information. I mean, it’s just an idea, but I think it could be…”

They shift into a conversation, then, on anger and guilt and all the awful feelings in the world—and how to live with them. It pains Gaster to think that others are feelings as wretched as he is, but he has to admit that it also makes him feel a little less lonely. He is not, and will never be, the only person suffering in this world.

Bitter comfort that is.

On the bright side, he may not have convinced Asgore tonight, but he feels like he’s made progress. Besides, he still has time. If nothing else, he doubts he’ll be going after Jackson until his transformation.

Still. It’d be nice to have something to look forward to.

* * *

“Papyruuuuus,” Gaster coos, nuzzling Papyrus’ nose, much to the child’s chagrin. “Papyrus, my babyyyy, look how well you’re healing!”

The fracture along the length of his spine has healed rapidly—it’s hardly more than a thin line, now. He almost looks like a normal blaster, if one ignores the shaved spines just above his shoulders.

“Yeah, you’re doin’ great,” Sans says, squishing Papyrus’ face between his hands. Papyrus sighs heavily. “I bet it feels a lot better now. Right, Dad?”

“I’m sure it does.”

“And what about you?” Sans climbs up, peeking under the bandages to examine the fractures along Gaster’s neck. They’re healing much more slowly than Papyrus’. Fortunately, the antibiotics are doing a phenomenal job of kicking his infection’s ass, and he feels miles better than he did even a few weeks ago. He’s amazed at how much of his misery was caused by that goddamned collar and the illness coursing through his bones.

It just goes to show, he supposes—mental and physical health are intrinsically linked. So it is that he hopes the prescriptions for their anxiety medications will be finalized soon; if he can eliminate some of his own emotional turmoil, as well as Papyrus’, he’s sure they’ll both feel even better. He had agreed to Dr. Willow’s advice regarding medication shortly after speaking with Grillby, and she’d gone to consult with a psychiatrist about his dosing, since he’s so, er, large, and also quite inconveniently the only adult of his species. The psychiatrist had, somewhat encouragingly, agreed to prepare the dosing for both his blaster form  _ and  _ his hominid form for when he manages to change back.

“Alright,” he says, drawing back and plucking a shirt from the boys’ dresser drawer. “What do you think? Stylish enough?”

The shirt is fashioned to look like a little tuxedo, and Sans nods enthusiastically when he sees it. Sans helps Papyrus put the shirt on, then tugs on his own clothes—a little blue button-up with a yellow tie and gray slacks—as Gaster goes to change. Gaster himself selects the purple button-up Thresh had designed for him (although he’d had to have it hastily remodified to make his fool wings fit— a fact which made Thresh shriek in upmost displeasure). Once dressed, he trots downstairs with his boys. As soon as they’re out of the house, he stretches himself out, fanning his wings with a pleased shiver. Everything is so  _ cramped  _ nowadays.

They reach Asgore’s shortly after 9:00 PM. The king’s home is decorated, although not extravagantly. Several gold and white balloons drift through the rooms, and glittery streamers line the walls. The dining room is the real show; on the table there are all sorts of snacks—tiny spongecakes, bowls of hard candies, platters of nachos and bowls of black eyed peas and collard greens. The tea and coffee are kept fresh and hot, and on the counter there’s a ring of gleaming wine glasses.

It’s a small get-together, this year, for Papyrus’ sake. Only he, his boys, Grillby, Fuku, Asgore, and Alphys are in attendance. Sans makes a beeline to Asgore, tugging the hem of his suit jacket. “Uncle Asgore?”

“Yes, little one?” Asgore asks, kneeling before him. 

“Can I go see Remy?”

“Oh, of course, of course. He’s in the bedroom just down the hall—I’m sure he misses you lots.”

“Be careful if you take him out,” Gaster adds as Sans bolts down the hallway with Papyrus on his heels. He’s not quite sure how well Papyrus will react so something so small and warm and...easily huntable. Somewhat nervously, he loops himself around the kitchen and sets his head on the floor. He keeps his eyes riveted down the hall, straining to listen for the sound of Papyrus growling or a rat screaming. 

Fortunately, he hears none of those things. A minute later Sans races back into the living room with Remy bundled to his chest, a wide grin on his face as he shows the rat off to Fuku. Eventually, the children settle down on the couches in the living room. Papyrus eyes Remy uncertainly, but he doesn’t seem to be interested in eating him, at the very least. Remy scurries his way across Sans’ shoulders, squeaking enthusiastically as Sans and Fuku begin sucking the helium from the balloons and giggling at each.

“I can’t believe the year it’s been,” Asgore admits, sipping a mug of golden flower tea and dragging Gaster’s attention from the children and back to the kitchen. 

“Tell me about it,” he says, beginning to ponder the intricacies of eating nachos without hands.

Grillby flickers in quiet agreement, cupping a mug of coffee between his palms. It bubbles gently. 

“So much has changed,” Alphys says, poking uncertainly at her spongecake. “F-for better or for worse?”

“For both?” Asgore offers.

“For both,” Gaster decides, and then he goes after the nachos. They spend the evening together, as they have every single year for the last five years. They play boardgames and they snack, they joke and they watch the parade on the television, they discuss old memories and new hopes. Papyrus falls asleep curled up next to Gaster shortly before 10:00, but Sans and Fuku actually make it until midnight.

_ Here.  _ Grillby pours a splash of sparkling grape juice into two wine glasses before offering them to the children.  _ Get ready to toast. _

“What do we toast for?” Sans asks, rubbing his eyes with one little balled-up fist. 

_ Glad tidings and good health.  _ Grillby straightens up, and Gaster’s eyes rivet onto the clock. He stretches, and he can feel her—he can feel the gentle ebb and flow of Time against him, soft and sweet and irrevocable. She has been with him since the beginning, and she will be with him long after the end, when he is  ~~ shattered across her in screaming shards ~~ gone. He lifts his own wine glass with his magic, and then, the moment the clock strikes midnight, clinks it with his family’s glasses.

“To the new year!” they chorus, and Gaster’s soul, for the briefest of moments, feel full of hope for the future—then he recalls that this will be one of his last New Years, and his soul trembles in his chest. He excuses himself outside for a moment and takes several deep breaths to still the quaking in his chest.

Alphys meets him on the porch a few moments later, shuffling her feet nervously. “Dr. Gaster?”

“Hm?”

“Here.” She hands him a file. “This is the idea I’ve come up with to initiate a—a shapeshift. Look it over and, um, and let me know what you t-think.”

He takes the file gently in one paw. It seems so small, so insignificant. So very many things do, in the beginning. (He thinks of a tiny cluster of cells floating in a beaker, and then he thinks of Sans’ smile.) He exhales, his breath clotting around in his muzzle in white streamers. “Thank you, Dr. Alphys. I appreciate it.”

She fiddles with the hem of her sleeve. “It won’t force your magic completely through the change. It will only trigger it to start. The rest is up to your b-biology, so hopefully it, um. It feels less invasive. I—I tr-tried to make it as painless a procedure as possible. I don’t want you to hurt anymore.”

“That’s very kind of you.”

“And I’m—I’m s-sorry I’ve hurt you before. What I did with Sans was—I’m sorry.”

“That’s alright.”

“It really, um. It isn’t.”

Well. At least she knows that much. Gaster gazes out across the king’s gardens, the golden flowers blooming under glassy starlight. For a moment, the two of them are silent. Then: “Do you like being a scientist?”

“I-I do, yes.”

“Alright.”

She glances uncertainly at him. “Why?”

“I’m only thinking,” he says. “You needn’t worry about it.”

“Do  _ you  _ like being a scientist?” 

Gaster hums quietly, tearing his eyes away from false stars and flowers. The space between his ribs aches, slow and unyielding. He makes no further response. 

Alphys exhales softly, studying the floor. “I—I think I’m g-going to go home. You have all the data you need to make a decision, s-so—”

“I’ll let you know as soon as I’ve decided.”

“Alright. H-Happy New Year, Dr. Gaster.”

“Happy New Year, Dr. Alphys.”

* * *

“Grillby.” Gaster nudges Grillby’s chest with his nose, following his name up with several slurred warbles. “Griiiiiillby.”

Grillby flickers in amusement, patting Gaster’s snout with one warm palm.  _ Yes? _

“You’re preeeeeetty.”

_ Thank you, dear. _

“Grillby?”

“Mm?”

“Why don’t I take Valium all the time? This is really nice.”

_ Because it would be bad for your health. I think this is quite enough for you. _

“I think you’re really right. But it’s so—it’s so nice.”

_ I know. _

“It’s like—like  _ really really  _ nice, to just not—to feel—” He sits back, lifting his paws and studying his claws. He splays them. Oooh, weird feelings. His paws are much too heavy. “I don’t feel bad. I like it.”

Something like grief crosses Grillby’s face, and Gaster doesn’t even feel bad about  _ that,  _ not really. He doesn’t feel bad about anything. He isn’t angry, he isn’t miserable, he isn’t frightened—isn’t even  _ worried. _ He just feels very strange and very sleepy. 

Valium truly is a gift. 

_ I’m...glad you aren’t feeling badly,  _ Grillby signs. He rests one hand against Gaster’s elbow, and Gaster leans into him, warbling quietly. Everything feels muted and dull and  _ safe.  _ Stars, it’s good. He thinks, briefly, of why he’s doing this—of the shift that’s going to overtake him shortly, of the way his bones will crack and warp—and feels not a blip of fear.

Everything is okay.

...he knows he shouldn’t feel that way, but he’s much too tired to be discomfited by it.

“Are you gonna be alright?” Sans asks, placing a hand on Gaster’s skull. There’s a worried frown on his face, and Gaster doesn’t like that. He doesn’t like that Sans worries. It’s all too much for his poor baby.

“I am going to be perfect,” he declares, nuzzling Sans. “Won’t feel a thing—right, Alphys?”

“R-right,” Alphys agrees. Beside her stands Dr. Gabi, jotting down notes on her clipboard. “If you’re feeling ready, d-do you want to head for the operating room now?”

Gaster nods muzzily, pushing himself to his feet. 

“I’ll see you soon,” Sans says, hugging his leg. Papyrus looks up at him, squinting uncertainly, and Gaster nudges him—oops, a little too hard. The pup topples over, squealing in offense, and Gaster chuckles. Asgore scoops Papyrus up, and Papyrus tenses but doesn’t struggle away from him.

“See you soon,” Gaster agrees. “Keep an eye on your brother.”

“Always.”

“We’re all rooting for you, my little one,” Asgore says, looking up at him. There’s a kind of confidence about him that soothes Gaster (however false he knows that confidence to be).

“And thank you very much for that,” Gaster says. “Where would I be without all of your support?”

_ Be good, alright?  _ Grillby adds.  _ I’m here if you need me. _

“I always need you, silly.”

Grillby is quite pink as Gaster turns to follow Alphys and Dr. Gabi into the operating room. It’s a nice color on him, Gaster thinks.

Alphys and Dr. Gabi have done what they can to make the room less intimidating, which Gaster thinks is quite sweet of them. There must be a candle lit somewhere—it smells like pumpkin pie. Soft classical music plays over the speakers. There are bright, cheerful posters on the walls, although the tables and tools themselves are still sharp and sterile and unnervingly silver.

He hesitates, for a moment.

Alphys rests a hand on his forearm. “It’s alright,” she says gently. “Y-you’re going to be just fine, I promise. Here, set your head on the table.”

He lays down and sets his head down on the table in the middle of the room, and Alphys and Dr. Gabi bustle about him, setting up their monitors. A part of him recognizes, logically, that he should be terrified—but his body refuses to be. Thank the stars for that or he’s sure he’d be panicking. He flinches as Alphys slides an IO into his ulna, and she pats his arm.

“That’s the only sting you’ll feel,” she says. “You’re all set up, Dr. G-Gaster. Dr. Gabi’s going to put the sedative into the IO now, so y-you’ll start feeling sleepy soon. When you wake up, it’ll all be over so, um, so don’t worry, okay?”

He doesn’t think he could worry if he  _ tried.  _ Even so, his wings clamp and his tail unconsciously makes its way between his legs as Dr. Gabi nears him. She rests a hand soothingly against his shoulder, then pushes a syringeful of clear fluid into the IO. She follows it up with another syringeful, because he is quite large and it takes quite a bit of sedative to do him in. As promised, however, he’s sleepy within minutes. Everything feels so heavy—especially his eyesockets. “Oh, wow,” he says, vaguely dizzy. His wings twitch in a futile attempt to help him keep his balance. The lights begin to blur. “That was fast.”

“Miracles of medicine,” Dr. Gabi says cheerfully, ducking underneath a wing. He sees her reach for a final syringe—this one has a strange, syrupy green liquid inside. Gaster blinks, and then—

He wakes up and he  _ aches.  _

Holy fuck, he’s been hit by a truck. 

He moves to sit up, then flails, because oh goodness, oh dear, where are his limbs? Why is he the wrong size? What are  _ proportions?  _ He lays back down, groaning. What?  _ What?  _ He stares up at the ceiling, befuddled. The lights are pleasantly dim. Somewhere, distantly, there’s music playing. He could sleep again, but his curiosity prickles at him. He should stay awake. He should figure out why he feels so very odd.

...he fails to stay awake.

When he wakes again, he feels slightly more centered. A warm blanket rests over him, and he rubs his cheek against it. Fuzzy. Warm. Very good. He stretches, rolls over, and then scrambles to catch his balance—which is, as it turns out, a good deal harder with no tail and no wings. He relaxes when he realizes he’s securely on a cot, letting out a nervous rattle of breath. 

“Dr. Gaster?” 

He glances up, blinking wearily at Alphys. “Hrmfpgh?” he says, quite succinctly.

“Are you a-alright? Do you need anything?” She shuffles her feet nervous. “Water, o-or should I get Dr. Gabi? Do you hurt? Are you nauseous? S-she said you might be nauseous.”

He shakes his head, then buries his face into his pillow. 

“O-okay, um—rest well?”

He mumbles something incoherent, then settles back into his breathing, quiet and steady and constant. They were right, he realizes slowly (it feels like thinking through syrup). This was nothing like Jackson. Waking up is slow and peaceful and calm, and nothing hurts. He has no idea how long he lays there, drifting in and out of a hazy sort of consciousness and pondering the strange shape he’s in. Distantly, he’s thrilled about this new shape—but only distantly. He begins to become  _ truly  _ thrilled when he can sit up and think a smidgen more clearly. Alphys brings him a glass of water, and he cups it in his hands—his hands, he has  _ hands! _ —and beams at her. 

“You did it,” he says, his eyes shining.

“Y-you too,” she says, clicking her claws together shyly. “Really, it was—um, it was the least I could do.”

“How did it go?”

“Oh, v-very well. It didn’t take long at all. Your magic reacted wonderfully with the s-serum and changed your form almost r-right away. It only took about five minutes.”

“Hm. It’s a wonder Jackson couldn’t have come up with something like that.”

“Maybe he didn’t want t-to.”

He stares into his water, at the reflection of the dim fluorescents above. “Yes,” he says, a touch more quietly. “Perhaps you’re right.”

It sickens him, to think that anyone would do—or in this case  _ avoid  _ doing—something simply for the sheer pleasure of watching someone else suffer. Then he thinks on what he wishes to do to Jackson, and he supposes he’s a massive hypocrite.

“Do you want me to s-send your family back?” Alphys asks gently.

He nods. Within minutes, Sans bursts through the door. Papyrus trots close on his heels, his head and tail low—he looks uncomfortable with their surroundings, although the recovery room has been made as non-clinical as possible. Asgore follows after them, and Grillby enters last, quietly shutting the door behind himself. When his eyes meet Gaster’s, he flickers every possible hue under the sun, and Gaster is much too tired to discern his emotions at the moment.

Instead, he opens his arms and smiles. “Well, hello, there.”

“Dad!” Sans scrambles onto the cot, lunging into his arms and burying himself against his chest. Gaster hugs him close—because  _ he can do that now— _ and rubs his back, laughing. “You’re back, you’re okay, you did it—”

“I did,” Gaster says, with a little bit of wonder. “I certainly did.”

“I’m so proud of you,” Asgore says, his eyes shining as he takes a seat on the edge of the cot and reaches out to squeeze Gaster’s shoulder. “We’re all so proud of you.”

_ Yes, well done,  _ Grillby says, his eyes warm and fond. He scoops Papyrus up so he won’t have to spring and strain his spine, depositing him on the cot. Gaster reaches an arm out for his youngest son, and Papyrus...hesitates. 

“Papyrus?” Gaster asks. “Hey, sweetheart, what’s wrong?”

Papyrus looks uncertainly at him, and then springs back off of the cot and crams himself underneath the armchair in the corner. Gaster’s soul chills. “What’s—why doesn’t he—?”

_ It’s probably because you look different,  _ Grillby soothes, taking a seat on the edge of the cot opposite Asgore.  _ He’ll come around soon, don’t worry. He’ll recognize you when he smells you and you don’t, er, smell so much like a hospital. _

“Plus he’s got the peppermint on his nose,” Sans explains, “so he  _ really  _ isn’t gonna be able to smell you. Don’t worry, okay? He’ll know you. He has to know you. You’re still you, just in a different, uh, shape.”

That’s—that’s right, isn’t it? Papyrus has only ever seen him once before in this form, and a pleasant meeting it was not. “Ah. Of course. That’s...logical.”

Only...Gaster doesn’t feel like he’s still himself. He hasn’t felt like himself for a long time, now. He feels very strange, and very different, and quite unusual. His emotions are as fluid as his form has become, and he’s not quite sure what he believes in anymore. But, he supposes as Sans snuggles closer to him, he still knows a few important things about himself:

His name is Wingdings Gaster, and he is the creator of many wonderful and terrible things. He is a lucky monster with many wonderful friends and a loving family all his own. He is a resident of Snowdin and an enthusiast for teas of all sorts. Most importantly, he is the father of two brilliant children, and he is going to make sure they get the lives they deserve.

Nothing is going to stand in the way of that.

* * *

The next day, Gaster sprawls out on his stomach, setting the bottle down in front of him. Two wary eyelights watch him from underneath the couch. “Hi, Papyrus,” he murmurs. He folds his arms in front of him and rests his chin on them, closing his eyes. He stays that way for quite some time—when he opens his eyes again, Sans stands next to him. He smells like soap.

“You know,” he teases, “there’s a perfectly good couch a few feet away.”

“I wanted to be here, with Papyrus,” Gaster says. Sans’ face softens. 

“Yeah?” Sans lays down next to him, cuddling up against his side.

“Yeah.”

Several minutes later, Papyrus takes a step out from under the couch—he takes courage, no doubt, from the fact Sans is here now. He eyes the bottle, and Gaster picks it up and leans the nipple towards him. Another slow, wary step, followed by another, and another, until Papyrus crouches in front of him. Gaster doesn’t move. Funnily enough, Papyrus doesn’t immediately sniff at the bottle. He sniffs at Gaster, instead—and as soon as he does, his tail begins to wag. It’s a low, uncertain wag, but—

But it’s a wag.

A relieved smile breaks over Gaster’s face, and Papyrus latches onto the bottle. “Yeah,” Gaster says, with a wobbly laugh. “You know me, huh, bud? You know me.”

As soon as Papyrus has finished his bottle, Gaster reaches forward—Papyrus leans back, so Gaster freezes. The pup snuffles warily at his fingers, and then, after a moment of hesitation, nudges into them. Gaster couldn’t stop the grin that spreads across his face if he tried. He scratches gently along Papyrus’ skull, and his son leans into him, sighing softly. He eases Papyrus back into his touch, petting across his spine and shoulders before daring, almost half an hour later, to slip his hands beneath his son and pick him up. 

Papyrus stiffens, and Gaster tucks him securely against his chest and slides an arm under him, hoping to ease his fear by making him feel secure. When Papyrus doesn’t relax, Gaster reaches up and curls his fingers around Papyrus’ vertebrae, just above his shoulders. It’s exactly where the concentrator had sat, so he keeps his touch gentle, but firm enough to simulate an adult blaster’s bite. Papyrus goes limp almost immediately, and Gaster breathes a sigh of relief and carries him upstairs. Sans trots up after him, but he heads for his bedroom instead of the bathroom.

Gaster expects Papyrus to skitter away as soon as he sets him on the bathroom floor, but the child doesn’t. Instead, he sways on his paws once Gaster releases his neck, then gives himself a firm shake. When he looks up at Gaster again, there’s even more recognition in his eyes—who but his father, after all, would dare to pick him up that way? Gaster grins and leans forward to bonk their heads together, and Papyrus pushes into him with a quiet chirrup. 

His baby. His baby knows him. His baby isn’t absolutely terrified of him—it’s awful that that has to feel like a victory, but  _ goddamn,  _ it does. 

Gaster turns the bathtub knob until warm water begins to flood the tub. Papyrus clacks his jaws in distaste at the noise, slinking around to hide behind the toilet. Gaster drizzles bubbles into the water, then adds several of Sans’ bathtub toys: a little plastic boat, several rubber duckies, and a turtle-shaped teething ring that will, undoubtedly, be destroyed as soon as Papyrus gets his jaws around it. 

Once the bath is ready, Gaster coaxes Papyrus gently out into the open, then scoops him up and sets him in the water. He stands stiffly, but relaxes as Gaster begins to lather his bones with soap. He leans into the touch, his head beginning to droop, so Gaster bats a rubber duck in his direction. The rubber duck’s head is quite cleanly removed from its body, and Papyrus gnashes the rubber enthusiastically between his teeth as the duck squeaks its death throes.

Once he’s scrubbed Papyrus with soap, Gaster rinses him off with a few cupfuls of warm water. He towels him dry, which Papyrus complains noisily about, before scooping him up again. Papyrus doesn’t tense up quite as much this time, relaxed and warm enough to simply sigh and lean against Gaster’s chest. They head to the boys’ bedroom and find Sans curled up on the bed—Papyrus squirms to join him, so Gaster sets him down, and the two of them take to play-wrestling while Gaster rifles through the dresser. 

“Here.” He holds up one of Sans’ old onesies—a little fuzzy one with the words OF COURSE I’M CUTE, LOOK AT MY DAD printed across the front. (That had been a gift from Grillby. Asgore had collapsed into hysterics the minute he saw it.) He shuffles forward, sitting down next to the bed. “Mind if I put this on you, Papyrus?”

Papyrus chews enthusiastically at the blankets, his tail wagging. When Gaster reaches forward, he opens his jaws and fits them around Gaster’s hand—for a moment, Gaster freezes, stiff with fear. He remembers those jaws closing down around his arm, splintering bone, he remembers  _ agony— _

But Papyrus doesn’t bite. He chews gently, and then pauses, studying Gaster’s face. Something quiet and introspective flashes through his eyes, and he releases Gaster and pulls back. (Whoever thinks Papyrus is  _ stupid  _ has quite another thing coming.)

“You need a chew toy or twelve, little man,” Gaster decides, gently pulling Papyrus forward and buttoning the onesie onto him. Once he’s dressed, Gaster releases him and stands. “Sans, would you be okay watching him for a few minutes while I go get cleaned up?”

“You got it, pops,” Sans says, laying still and patient as Papyrus clambers all over him. “Professional Pap-sitter, that’s me.”

Gaster leaves the Professional Pap-sitter to it, heading back to the bathroom. He showers quickly, basking in the warmth of the water and scrubbing his bones off—at the same time, he takes a few minutes to re-acquaint himself with his new form. He waggles his fingers and curls his toes, examines his thin limbs and clicks his flat teeth together. God, it’s good to be small again. He feels sturdier, too. With his magic stretched less thinly, it’s begun to rebuild his bone.

Once he’s rinsed the suds off, he runs his fingers along the fractures in his neck; those haven’t magically vanished, unfortunately, nor have the cracks in his skull or the holes in his palms. He dries himself off, then slathers antibiotic ointment across his fractures and studies himself in the mirror. How odd it is to see these new injuries on his old body. He reaches up, rubbing his fingers across his skull, his slumped eyesocket. That’s ugly. He supposes it’s only going to get worse, the more his magic fades. 

(His soul twists unpleasantly at the reminder—three years. He swallows bile.)

He dresses in sweatpants and a hoodie, more than content to stay in and lounge all day. He has things to do, of course—promises to keep, a right to fulfill, a king to argue with, a bastard to murder. He’s certainly neglected his duties for long enough, but he thinks—

He thinks, just for today, he’s going to neglect them a little longer. He has bigger responsibilities, right now, and they’re just down the hall waiting for him. As he heads back towards Sans’ bedroom, however, he hears howling outside. Sans and Papyrus both poke their heads out of the bedroom doorway, warbling in concern.

“What’s that?” Sans asks. 

“I don’t know. Let me check. Stay up here.” Gaster trots down the stairs, opening the front door and sticking his head outside. The dogs stand in the street, their breath pluming and their eyes shining. “Hello, there. What are you all up to?”

“We came to see you!” Dogamy says, his tail wagging violently—but he keeps his distance from the house, which Gaster quite appreciates. “Asgore told us you’d come back from the hospital, and we wanted to give you and the boys our well-wishes. Would you mind visitors too terribly much? We won’t stay long.”

Gaster steps back and opens the door, a fond smile flickering across his face. As soon as he does, the dogs plunge into the house and into his arms. He stumbles backwards and wraps them up in a hug, grimacing good-naturedly as they cover his face with enthusiastic licks, whining in their excitement. He ruffles their ears, and they drop back onto all fours and bound around him, yipping like puppies.

Sans stands at the top of the stairs, his eyes bright. Papyrus crouches a few feet behind him, wary—but he isn’t growling. It’s another tiny step forward. Sans bounds down the stairs and the dogs surround him, too, albeit more carefully. They take turns embracing him, and he doesn’t miss the way they keep a careful eye on Papyrus.

“Asgore’s on his way—he got caught up in some last-minute paperwork, but he wanted to say hello, too, and make sure you were still recovering well,” Dogaressa says. 

“Well, then.” Gaster heads upstairs, reaching for Papyrus. Papyrus’ eyes flicker uncertainly, but he doesn’t pull away when Gaster touches him; Gaster scoops him up, cradling him against his chest and snagging a throw blanket off of the couch. He drapes it over Papyrus, both to keep him warm and to give him a place to hide, if he feels like he needs to. “Let’s go find him.”

Sans hurriedly tugs on his boots and coat, as does Gaster. They head outside and into Waterfall—Asgore is speaking to a group of guards. Gaster can hear his voice, warm and fond, from a great distance. Soon as he sees his king, dressed in the fluffiest sweater in the Underground, and his soul floods with love. 

“Asgore!” he shouts. He waves one hand in the air, keeping Papyrus tucked close with the other. Sans runs ahead of him, laughing with delight.

Asgore whips around, his eyes wide. He spreads his arms. Sans lunges up and into them, and Asgore squeezes him into a hug, spinning around and laughing giddily. “Sans! Oh, my little one, hello—and Wingdings, you great fiend! Get over here right now, stars, let me see you—”

As soon as Gaster reaches him, Asgore drags him into a hug. Papyrus squirms uncomfortably between them, so Asgore loosens his grip some and settles for covering Gaster’s face in nuzzles, instead. 

“Good afternoon,” he says, and Gaster scrunches his nose. Asgore nuzzles  _ tickle.  _ “How do you feel? Are you sick at all? Do you hurt today? Are you still doing well?”

Gaster laughs, pushing Asgore’s face away. The king settles for nuzzling Sans in his place. Sans is more than content with this, his eyes shutting in bliss. “Yes, yes, I’m very well. I feel good, actually. I’m still a little sore, but it isn’t bad at all. I’m just glad to be home and back to normal.”

Asgore draws them all into a hug, a broad smile on his face. “Well by the stars, welcome back, my boy.”

It is the last time Asgore will be so very pleased to see him, and he knows it.

* * *

“Wait,  _ into  _ the sauce?” Sans asks, his voice skeptical. Gaster cracks an eye open, looking lazily into the kitchen to see Fuku’s response.

_ Yeah. Trust me, it makes it better.  _ She cracks an egg into a mixing bowl, handing Sans the whisk. He goes to work mixing whatever strange concoction they’re working on, brow furrowed with concentration. Gaster closes his eye again, content to let them do what they will, so long as they don’t set the kitchen on fire. 

A few seconds later, he hears the clack of claws on the floor, and then Papyrus jumps up to lay on his feet. “Hey, Paps,” he murmurs, yawning. He lifts an arm for his son. Papyrus, after only a moment of hesitation, climbs over him and snuggles up against his chest. He hears Grillby crackle in amusement and pries his eyes open again, glancing over at the elemental—who is, in theory, watching over the children in the kitchen. In reality, his eyes are either on his book or on Gaster.

_ What?  _ Gaster signs, amused. 

_ Nothing,  _ Grillby says, waving him off.  _ He’s just gotten a lot more comfortable with you, is all. _

_ Right? Not what I was expecting, when I thought about returning to this form,  _ Gaster admits.  _ I’m glad. _

_ Me too. _

_ Dad, was it seven eggs or eight?  _ Fuku asks.

_...it was two. Oh, dear— _

As Grillby goes about trying to salvage their disaster, Gaster snorts and closes his eyes once more. He drifts lazily for a time, surrounded by the quiet, domestic noises of the household. Stars, but he missed this. He’s so glad he gets to enjoy it again. There’s only one blemish in the afternoon—one  _ goddamned  _ blemish he can’t get out of his head. If he thinks about it too long, he tastes blood. His soul boils with anger, and Papyrus stirs warily next to him. 

“Sorry,” Gaster apologizes, petting his skull. “Sorry, little one. It’s not for you, I promise.”

...not for him. Not for anyone here. That anger is for one person and one person only. Gaster needs to get rid of it. The shift had put his fury on temporary hold, but now that he’s back in his own head, it haunts him. It digs its claws in and doesn’t let go. He wants so  _ badly  _ to move forward, to recover, to feel  _ okay  _ again, but he knows he can’t—not until he rids himself of these poisonous thoughts and wants, not until he takes what is rightfully  _ his.  _

Asgore won’t be happy with him. Neither will Grillby, or Alphys, or anyone, really, but Asgore especially. But how can they deny him? He needs this. His _children_ need this. What’s more, he _wants_ this—and that scares him more than anything, that he _wants_ so damned badly. It makes him feel sick when he thinks about it, but he has no idea how to make the wanting _stop._ Every time he closes his eyes, he imagines—fuck, he _fantasizes_ about it, about torturing the stupid fuck who did this to him. He needs to finish this damnable argument with Asgore, and soon. The longer he puts it off, the worse he feels—the more his anger curdles inside of his chest, thick and poisonous. 

Stars, but he  _ hates  _ upsetting Asgore!

Although the longer he waits, the more likely it is that the other visitors at the Judgement are going to break their vows of silence. If word reaches Grillby or Sans about what Gaster plans to do, he has no doubt he’ll never hear the end of it. Of course, he’ll never hear the end of it after the fact, either—but at least when all’s said and done no one will be able to stop him. He fears if Grillby, Asgore,  _ and  _ Sans all tried to convince him to let the Judge kill Jackson, he’d listen. As it is, he’s having a hard enough time working around Asgore.

Papyrus growls quietly, and Gaster’s eyes snap open. Grillby crouches in front of him, a hand halfway to his shoulder—the hand withdraws as soon as Papyrus growls, and Papyrus subsides, setting his chin protectively on Gaster’s shoulder. “It’s alright,” Gaster murmurs to his son, scratching the crest of his skull gently. Papyrus grumbles quietly but doesn’t shift away. “Hey, Grillby. Are they done, er, cooking?”

_ I believe so,  _ Grillby says.  _ But you looked upset. Is something the matter? _

_ Hm? Oh, no. I was just thinking.  _

_ Are you sure? You know you can tell me if something’s bothering you. _

His eyes flicker away. Could he?  _ Could _ he tell Grillby? ...no. He doesn’t think so. He can tell Grillby a damned lot, but to tell him that Gaster wants to maim someone, wants to  _ torture  _ them, to tear them apart and listen to them scream and watch them  _ rot  _ from the inside out _ — _

No. Not even Grillby is that understanding, and Gaster can’t blame him.

_ I know,  _ he says, smiling and sitting up. Papyrus huffs and hops out of his lap, heading over to Sans because  _ clearly  _ his father makes for a terrible pillow.  _ Thank you. Now, then. What are we eating…? _

For once, the children’s cooking skills are not the scariest part of the evening. Small mercies.

* * *

Gaster takes a few days to adjust himself to having a hominid form, but a few days and no more. He can’t afford to spare more. Monday morning, he throws on an old t-shirt and jeans—working clothes—and tucks his lab coat, as well as a few pairs of nitrile gloves, into his interdimensional box. For what he has planned, he needs to wear something he won’t regret getting filthy. Once he’s dressed, he slips into the basement. He rummages through his locked drawers, selects the dullest scalpel he can find, and slides it into his pocket. After that, he leaves the boys with the Dogi and heads to the palace for one last argument. He has a feeling it isn’t going to end very well, but one can’t say he didn’t  _ try. _

Stars, he just hopes Asgore can forgive him, after this. He doesn’t think he could bear to lose that friendship.

“No,” Asgore repeats, a deep scowl on his face. “Your right it may very well be, but we both know this isn’t what’s best for your mental state.”

“My mental state?” Gaster scoffs, folding his arms across his chest and leaning back in his seat. “The hell do you mean? Killing that man would be an improvement to it. At the very least, I can stop thinking about him so damn much.”

“That’s what  _ therapy  _ is for, Wingdings, not  _ murder.” _

“Que sera, sera.” He waves a hand dismissively. “It’s my right. I want it. I hate him and I’m going to to kill him.”

“See, that’s just it! It isn’t—it isn’t punishment for a crime, at this point, is it? It’s you mediating on how to slaughter someone to satisfy your own desires. That’s not you! You’re a gentle person, little one. If you do this, it’s going to ruin you.”

“No,” Gaster hisses, leaning forward.  _ “That man  _ ruined me. I am what he deserves.”

“He did not ruin you,” Asgore snaps. “You are not  _ ruined.  _ Never think it.”

“Oh, what? He can’t ruin me, but  _ I  _ can? I haven’t done anything nearly as evil as he did.”

“Stop using my words against me, you snake.”

“Then stop saying stupid words!”

Asgore flops back into his throne, growling. “I forgot how frustrating you could be.”

“Well I’m  _ sorry  _ I’m not your perfect, patient, pushover of a person anymore,” Gaster says, sipping his tea passive-aggressively. Golden fucking flower. Tastes like shit. “I just want this one thing, Asgore. The Judge has already granted it to me; you know you can’t go against her without making a big damned deal of everything. Just agree, won’t you?”

“No,” Asgore says, his voice hard. “Perhaps she’ll let you. Perhaps she’ll twist my arm into letting you, but by god, I’m not going to make it easy for you. If you do this, I hope you’ll think about my disappointment the entire time.”

Gaster snaps his teeth in frustration. “You’re so  _ stubborn.” _

_ “I’m  _ the one who’s being stubborn right now? Me?” He drags his paws down his face. “Oh, little one. What happened to you?”

“I’ve told you exactly what happened,” Gaster hisses. “I was tricked into thinking my  _ baby  _ was killed, I  _ grieved  _ for him, I discovered my work had been abused and used to create countless children who were then tortured and slaughtered, I was made into a science experiment, I was forced into a different body with no control whatsoever—and let me tell you what an  _ excruciating experience  _ that was—and I—!”

“Wingdings.” Asgore leans forward, resting his paws on his shoulders. Gaster sucks in a breath. Had he been shouting? He hadn’t meant to shout. “That’s it. Breathe. Perhaps I’m being too hard on you, and for that, I’m sorry. Of course you’re bound to think and feel upsetting things like this, after a trauma like yours.”

“Of course I’m bound to make a pain in the ass of myself,” Gaster translates grimly.

Asgore...doesn’t deny it. He smiles apologetically, sitting back in his chair. “I don’t hold it against you,” he offers.

“Thanks,” Gaster says, his voice flat.

“So, although I can understand where you’re coming from,” Asgore continues, his voice poisonously patient, “I also understand that you’re not thinking straight, and I can’t in good conscience let you do this to yourself.”

“Of course not.” Gaster grinds his teeth. “Please, keep telling me what I should do,  _ Your Majesty.  _ I’m so infinitely  _ grateful.” _

Asgore exhales softly. “Little one…”

“Don’t call me that,” Gaster snaps. “I’m not  _ little  _ anything. I’m an adult, alright? I know what I’m doing, and I can make my own goddamn decisions.”

“I know that,” Asgore says soothingly, making placating motions with his hands. “You’re very wise in your own right, but surely you can see that you aren’t the most objective person in this case. You can’t make decisions like this on your own. Just let the Judge deal with him; the result will be the same, but you’ll preserve your—your—”

“What? My  _ innocence?”  _ Gaster laughs—the noise feels as cracked as he does.  _ “What  _ innocence? That  _ fuck  _ took whatever was left. He  _ owes  _ me.”

“Owes you what? Satisfaction? Revenge? His pain? His  _ life?” _

“Yes! All of it!” Gaster shoves his mug of tea away from him, baring his teeth. 

_ “Why?  _ Why does killing him matter so much to you? I know he was awful, but this—”

“Because I’m going to die soon!” Gaster snarls in one final, desperate attempt to make Asgore see reason. “Because I cannot sustain two souls on my own, because it is _killing_ me to keep my children alive! I _need_ what he has, what little soulmagic I can get from him. It will give me a few more years with the boys, with _you_ , but _I_ have to be the one to kill him.”

Asgore’s eyes flood with horror, and he stands up sharply. “What?! What do you mean—”

“But that’s not all, you know?” Gaster paces in a short circle, his bones rattling. There go his damned emotions again, shaking him out of control. Stars, he hates them, he hates feeling this way. “I  _ need  _ to kill him, oh, yes, but Asgore—I  _ want  _ to. I want to make him  _ hurt.  _ Isn’t that sick? Look what he’s done to me.”

“What do you mean you’re going to die soon?” Asgore’s chest heaves, his breath short and choppy. His paws shake. “What do you mean? How soon?”

“Never mind.” Bitterness prickles beneath his ribs, but he breathes it out. It isn’t Asgore’s fault, not really. The king has his own innocence to preserve—stars know there's little enough left. Gaster can’t begrudge him that, even if it pains him beyond measure to have to go against his king’s orders. “I’ll deal with this myself. Try not to hold it against me for too very long, would you?”

He steps back at the same time Asgore reaches for him—steps back, through time and space and into a jail cell. He staggers woozily for a moment, catching himself against the wall, his soul cramping. Shit. His magic gets weaker every damn day, and teleporting is no easy feat on such a limited supply. Even so, when he sees who’s cowering in front of him, he manages to grin.

“Hey, Jackson,” he says. “What’s up?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun and completely useless fact: monsters celebrate their holidays in different timeframes than humans!! for example, school years start earlier and last longer (bc the growing seasons are different underground and thus kids weren’t generally needed to help with harvest) and the new year is in the late summer instead of winter. they also have special monster holidays that humans don’t celebrate, and they don’t celebrate some human holidays. also !! this chapter used to be two separate chapters but i crammed them together because i am Impatient, hence why we have two 'flowers for algernon' quotes instead of one. hooray !!!!


	30. sisyphus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **warnings: violence, blood, injuries, torture, gore, sadism, discussions of child abuse/neglect/death**
> 
> “Algernon died two days ago.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

_“_ What the fuck are you doing here?” Jackson asks, flinging himself back against the far wall. His feathers slick down with fear, and his chest heaves. “How the hell—”

“Teleportation. It’s a skeleton thing.”

“How are you—”

“This shape?” Gaster stretches his arms out, flexes his fingers before continuing to sign. “I shifted. You didn’t get rid of the skeleton DNA, huh? I can’t say I blame you. Pleiotropy.”

Jackson’s wings clamp tightly against his back. The bright orange of his jumpsuit clashes with the tawny brown of his feathers, but _damn_ if he doesn’t look just perfect in a prison setting. He’d only look better dead. “You can’t be here. The king said you couldn’t hurt me, he said—”

“Yes, yes, I know what the king said,” Gaster says, grimacing. The thought of Asgore puts a bitter taste in his mouth, spoils his craving for blood. He doesn’t want to think about that longer than he has to. “I do hate to disappoint him, but he’ll get over it. Besides, the Judge said I could, so this _technically_ isn’t illegal.”

“No, no no no that’s not what that means, that’s not—”

“Come on.” Gaster reaches out, pressing his hand to Jackson’s chest. Jackson cringes away from him, and he snorts and curls his fingers into the front of that garrish prison jumpsuit. “What, really? You’re this much of a coward out of your element? And here I expected something exciting.”

Keeping his grip on Jackson firm, Gaster lashes out with his magic and tears through spacetime once more. They land in familiar operating room, and Gaster drops to his knees and retches. Black magic bubbles behind his teeth as his soul shrieks damnation at him. He hears Jackson move seconds before a foot collides with his ribs; his bones, already thinned by his loss of magic, crack easily under the blow. He snarls in pain, seizing Jackson’s soul in his blue magic and slamming him into the nearest wall with a hearty _crunch._

It’s the first time he hears Jackson cry out in pain, but it is far from the last—and it is every bit as delightful as he thought it would be.

Gaster drops his grip on Jackson’s soul, letting the owl slump to the ground as he heaves himself back onto his feet. Pain flares down his torso and through his spine—a broken rib or two, it feels like. He ignores it as best he can (he’s felt far, far worse in this very room) and wipes a hand across his mouth. It comes away smeared and black. “Well, that’s more like it,” he says. “Glad to see you’ve still got some fight in you. Killing someone who’s already given up would be kind of dreary.”

“Get the hell away from me,” Jackson pants as Gaster strides towards him. He holds his right wing awkwardly, stiffly. His golden eyes glitter with pain. “You’re going to regret this, you know you are. You never had the guts to hurt something, not even when you needed to.”

Gaster reaches down and curls his fingers into the collar of Jackson’s jumpsuit, hauling him up and setting him on his feet. “Well,” he says. “You managed to ruin that, amongst other things.”

Then he pulls back a fist, and he slams it into Jackson’s eye—right at the edge of the orbit, where the bone is thinnest and gives way with a pleasant _crack._ Jackson howls and clutches his face. Gaster presses his advantage, driving his fist into Jackson’s stomach without giving him a chance to recover. Jackson doubles over—oh, the pains of having a digestive system. Gaster doesn’t envy him. Before he can land his next blow, however, Jackson lunges to the side. He whirls around to face Gaster, his eyes wide and frantic. For a brief moment, Gaster’s soul flickers purple and sticky—then the thin metal bracelet around Jackson’s wrist begins to beep a steady alarm. In response, Jackson wails in pain and yanks his hand close to his chest, his magic jerking away from Gaster. The alarm cuts off sharply.

“At least it’s less humiliating than a collar,” Gaster offers. “I imagine feeling so powerless can’t be any fun, though—I know if _I_ were in your position, I’d get damn sick of it damn fast.”

Jackson lunges for the door. Gaster hauls up a wall of bones in front of him—they’re fractured things, thin and ugly, but he weaves them together and they damn well do their job. As Jackson skids to a stop, Gaster reaches forward and snags his fingers into the back of his shirt. He hauls him backwards, slamming him against the operating table and holding him there with a forearm against his throat. He gags for air as Gaster buckles dusty straps across his wrists and ankles and chest.

As soon as he’s finished, Gaster draws back, wiping his hands off on his jeans. He strolls to the opposite side of the room, fishing a pair of gloves out of his inventory. He tugs them on, listening the frantic flapping of Jackson’s wings and his furious shouts as he struggles. “—me up, let me go! You can’t do this, Gaster! You can’t do this to me!”

“Is that right? No one’s going to stop me. You can call for help all you want, but no one will come. No one’s going to help you, because nobody loves you, do they? You spend all your time with your work, striving for the greater good, and what does it get you? Nothing. Without love, even the greatest science is pretty worthless, don’t you think?”

Jackson strains against the bands holding him in place, his face twisted with rage. “You never understood! What could be done with your science, your work—”

“I understood perfectly what could be done with my work,” Gaster says, pulling on his labcoat. He buttons it neatly, smoothing the lapels down. It won’t do to _try_ to get his clothes dirty, even if they’re old. “That is precisely why I chose not to pursue it. Why couldn’t you have just done as I told you? Why couldn’t you have just left well enough alone? Damn, kid.”

He steps out of the OR, ignoring Jackson’s shrieks of protests. He walks through rooms full of empty cages, room that still stink of misery and sterile death. At the top of the stairs, he stops to peek outside. Jackson’s house stands empty and quiet; the Guard haven’t caught onto him yet, evidently. He shuts the basement door and flicks the locks: one, two, three, four. Then he heads back down the stairs.

“So,” he says, sliding his scalpel out of his pocket. It gleams under the faded fluorescent lights. “It’s time for my villain monologue, right? Let’s start with this: I have to kill you.”

“No! No no no no you actually don’t—”

“Do you think that’s what my children would have said, if they could speak? Do you think they wanted to die for you? Do you think they wanted to suffer?” He leans against the counter, folding his arms over his chest. “It didn’t matter to you. They suffered, and they died, and they had no choice in the matter—and for that, I want to kill you. But it’s not just that, you know? I _need_ to kill you.”

“No you don’t,” Jackson hisses, his feathers bristling. “You really, really don’t. You’re just doing this to make yourself feel better. It’s petty revenge.”

“I gave my soul to Sans—and through him, to Papyrus. I am all they need, and I am not enough,” Gaster explains. “I’ll be dead in three years, the way things are going, but by killing someone else, I can take their soulmagic. I can make myself stronger. Unfortunately, right now, you’re the only viable canidate I’ve got for murder.”

“You gave it your soul?” Jackson stares at him in disbelief. “Which one? 134? It didn’t need a soul. You can’t blame me for that, you can’t—”

“Of course I can. You’re the one who created him, you dumb fuck. And if there’s one thing I’m sure of—” He twirls the scalpel between his fingers, prowling to Jackson’s side. “It’s that you should _never_ create something you aren’t willing to take care of. But you did, and now he’s my responsibility, and I can’t do it alone. I need your help. I am going to kill you, and I am going to take your magic, and I am going to use it to keep myself alive for as long as my children need me. You should be grateful. Your death is for a good cause. Not all bastards get to be so very lucky.”

“You’re fucking _crazy,”_ Jackson hisses, his pupils swollen with fear. “And you—you feel bad! You don’t actually want to do this, you know you don’t actually want to do this or you wouldn’t be explaining yourself to me—”

“Oh, now, that’s a clever theory. Please, tell me more about what I’m feeling. Everybody’s really fond of doing that, these days.” Gaster taps his scalpel beneath one of Jackson’s eyes—they’re amber. In this light, they look like whiskey. They remind him of Grillby, and a twist of guilt seizes his soul again. He ruthlessly ignores it. “But if you’re as smart as I know you are, you ought to understand that being quiet is in your best interest right now.”

The wave of terror that comes from Jackson when the scalpel nears his eye is almost palpable, and he holds his silence—if only for the moment.

“But it’s not _just_ that I want to kill you, you know? I want to hurt you. You have _no idea_ how much I want to hurt you before I kill you.” Gaster paces a short circle, giving his bones a solid rattle to disperse some of his anxious energy. “Of course, I can’t do everything I want to do to you. I can’t even do a percent of it. If I had my way, I’d string you up, tear your guts out, saw your limbs off one by one, watch you die for _days—_ sick kinda stuff, huh?”

He sighs wistfully, rocking back on his heels. “But of course, if I did that, they’d take my kids away from me, no questions asked. I couldn’t blame them. Leaving kids alone with someone _that_ unhinged, now, that’s irresponsible. Fortunately, I love my kids more than I hate you, so we’re just gonna have to settle for a few measly wounds and make sure you _dust_ before anyone sees them.”

Gaster slams his scalpel through Jackson’s left palm and leaves it there as the owl wails. His words are a blur of nonsense; they don’t matter, so Gaster doesn’t even bother processing them. Only one thing matters, right now—hurting this _fuck_ so everything can get better. He draws the scalpel up, around the curve of Jackson’s thin wrist and halfway down the side of his forearm. Then he draws back, flicking blood off of his fingers and the scalpel. 

“You know, I keep waiting to feel something. I was _hoping_ I’d feel something, when I got to this point. Guilt? I mean, I’m hurting somebody. I thought I’d feel at least a little bad. Or maybe I’d feel relief for finally, _finally_ getting to do this. Maybe I’d be too scared to go through with it. Maybe I’d be excited, maybe I would feel good. But—”

He tastes salt. He’s crying. The tears trickle between his teeth. 

“But I don’t feel anything. I’m just so tired, Jackson. I want this to be over with. I want to go back to normal—to the good life. I had that, you know? I had—I had a house in a wonderful little town with lovely neighbors, I had brilliant friends, I had a job I loved, I had _Sans._ Stars, all that was missing was the white picket fence. And then you—and _then you—”_

For a moment, his fingers twitch—the impulse to slit Jackson from throat to abdomen shudders through his bones. He slams the scalpel into Jackson’s right side, instead, careful not to puncture anything vital. Jackson screams, and Gaster carves the scalpel around to the front of his chest, keeping that ugly red line directly over one of the owl’s narrow ribs. He considers it fair repayment for the broken rib currently aching over his own soul.

“A part of me wants to think I’m doing this for the kids, you know? Avenging them. That makes it sound noble. But the truth is, it’s not for them. This doesn’t help them. Hurting you doesn’t help anyone. This part is just for _me.”_ He pulls away and paces the room, circling the shattered tank that rests near the center of it. “...do you know what it felt like? When you strapped me down on that very same table, when you cracked open my bones and scraped out the marrow? When you shoved me in this goddamn tank and left me to twist myself apart while I watched you torture and murder my _babies?_ Do you have _any idea—”_

Gaster shudders, his fingers flexing around the scalpel. Dark, coagulating blood sticks messily to his gloves.

“I’m sorry,” Jackson says, gasping. Tears streak the downy, pale feathers of his face. “I’m sorry please I’m so sorry—”

“Nooo, you’re not,” Gaster says. “You’re just saying that because you’re tired of being afraid, because you’re tired of hurting. And you know what? _So am I._ But I can’t _stop_ hurting, can I? Not after what you did to me. Every single time I think I’m getting better, every time I think I’m getting somewhere, I sit and I stop and I think about it and it all comes back to _you—_ to the fact that you’re alive, and safe, and comfortable, and two hundred and eighteen of us _aren’t anymore._

“I can’t move on, not as long as you’re alive. And you know what? I _want_ to move on now. I have people to live for. I have children to raise. I am going to make a good life for myself and my family. I am going to be _happy_ for every single one of these years I have left _—_ I’m not going to let you take that from me any longer than you already have.”

Gaster moves the scalpel up, presses the edge to the hammering, terrified pulse of the carotid artery in Jackson’s throat. “If it’s any consolation,” he says quietly, as Jackson’s trembling increases tenfold, “your soul could find no better use than this. You will fix the mistake you made. Best you find your peace with that. It’s the only good you will have ever done me or my children.”

“No, no, please, Dr. Gaster please I said I’m sorry—I know I made mistakes, I know I did and I swear to the gods I won’t ever make them again, but you don’t have to do this—please I don’t want to die I’m _scared_ please pl-please don’t do this to me—”

Gaster takes a deep breath, steeling himself. His hands shake. He smells smoke.

Wait—he smells smoke? 

_Shit,_ he smells smoke. 

He whirls around, baring his teeth at the door as his soul plummets. Fuck, fuck, _fuck._ He doesn’t want Grillby to see him like this, covered in blood with a fucking _living monster_ strapped to the operating table. He doesn’t want _anyone_ to see him like this. Asgore was supposed to be the only one who knew, and that knowing was to be clinical at best. He wasn’t supposed to see the blood, the wounds, the torture. He was only supposed to see the _dust._

Panic freezes him for a moment, and it’s a moment too long. Grillby whips around the corner and into the room. His eyes find on Gaster, rake over his body in terror, and then fixate on the scalpel in his hand. Gaster stumbles a step back, holding the scalpel point over Jackson’s throat again. The horror that crosses Grillby’s face snares Gaster’s soul and makes it _ache._

“Don’t,” Gaster says, his hands shaking. He signs with his magic, thin and weak though it is. Grillby freezes in place, his chest heaving. Asgore stumbles into the room behind him, and several Guards rush in next. Guilt burns a cold line down Gaster’s spine as their eyes rivet to him. “I—I can explain. He attacked me, I had to stop him, I had to—”

“Help,” Jackson says, his voice cracking. “Please, he’s h-hurting me, please stop him, just make him stop, _please—”_

Grillby takes a step forward and Gaster snarls, pressing the tip of the scalpel down harder. Blood begins to trickle away from the tarnished steel—bright, arterial blood. It will take seconds for Jackson to die as soon as that artery is slit. Gaster’s got to do it, he’s just got to do it, _he’s just got to—_

Asgore sets a hand on Grillby’s shoulder and pulls him back. “Go back,” he orders the Guards. “All of you, go back upstairs. Wait there.”

The Guards, with matching expressions of horror, back away. Asgore holds his hands up, approaching Gaster like a damned _beast,_ and Gaster bristles. “Stop moving,” he repeats, his voice wobbling. “I don’t want you here. Get out.”

“Wingdings, little one, that’s enough,” Asgore says, his voice soft—but Gaster can see the horror in his eyes, he can see the _fear._ Grillby slinks around the side of the room, putting himself at Gaster’s flank. Gaster keeps a close, wary eye on him. “Put that down. Let’s talk about this.”

“No. We’ve done enough talking. I need to kill him,” Gaster says. “I have to kill him, and I’m sorry, but you can’t be here. Get out. Now.”

“You don’t need to kill him. That isn’t going to fix things.”

“It will keep me alive for just a few years longer, won’t it? That’s all I need. I just need more _time.”_ His voice twists, and he swallows hard. “The boys—I can’t abandon the boys, not again, not so soon. I want to be okay again. I want to be happy, even if it’s just for a little while longer. I have too much to lose now. There’s no way I’m giving up on life again. If this is what it takes to survive, this is what I’m doing.”

“Wingdings—”

“Get out!”

“I can’t leave. I can’t let you hurt him like this. It isn’t _right,_ little one, you know that.”

“It feels right. I want to hurt him.” His jaw wobbles. They don’t understand. They don’t understand how _much_ Gaster wants to hurt him. “I want to hurt him, Asgore.”

“I know. I know, little one, shhh. We’ll figure everything out. We’ll make you feel better, but this isn’t the way to do it. Come here.” Asgore opens his arms—what a familiar invitation. How many times has Gaster buried himself there to find comfort? “Please, come here. Everything will be alright. Trust me.”

Gaster leans forward for the barest split of a second, wavering on his feet—and that’s his mistake. The second the scalpel shifts away from Jackson’s carotid, Grillby lunges. He slams into Gaster’s side, and Gaster yelps and drops the scalpel before he can accidentally cut Grillby with it. Grillby curls around him, tries to soften the blow as they both crash into the ground, and Gaster (as well as his broken rib) is distantly grateful for that—very distantly. Mostly he’s pissed. 

Grillby sits up, wrestling Gaster up with him and caging him in his arms. “Let go,” Gaster hisses, trying to pry himself out of Grillby’s grip. “Let go, you fucker, _let me up!”_

“Not a chance,” Grillby growls, and _damn him_ but he’s stronger than Gaster is. Gaster could shift forms, of course, but the idea petrifies him—and he doubts he has enough magic for it. Instead, he resigns himself to trying to struggle rather futilely. He should probably stop, if only to conserve energy, but the idea seems utterly impossible. If he doesn’t fight, he’ll fall apart, and how fucking _awful_ he’ll feel if he falls.

“I need to hurt him,” he hisses, his eyes blazing as Asgore rushes forward, unbuckling Jackson’s restraints. Common sense shrieks for him to stop there, to quit digging himself further into this hole, but at the same time—at the same time, what a fucking _relief_ it is to get that off of his chest, to let someone know what a damnable snare he’s gotten himself tangled into. “Stop! I need to hurt him, I need to, _I need to, you can’t take him from me—”_

“Shhh.” Grillby presses his face to the back of Gaster’s neck, beginning to rock gently. “Shhhh, hush. You don’t need to hurt him. You don’t need to hurt anyone.” Flames flicker in front of him, form the shape of soft orange hands so Grillby can sign as he hushes Gaster. _You’re alright, Wings. Breathe. You’re going to be fine._

He writhes as Asgore scoops Jackson up, heading for the doors. “No!” he shrieks. He lashes out with blue magic, trying frantically to push Grillby away from him, to no avail. The elemental has a vice grip, and shoving him away only serves to send a savage bolt of pain throughout Gaster’s ribcage. “Asgore, bring him back! _Asgore!”_

“Shh, Wings, enough.” Grillby squeezes him hard—too hard. He snarls, clawing at Grillby’s arms. It does not a fucking _lick_ of good, but it makes him feel the tiniest bit more in control, and by the stars, he’s desperate for any form of control he can get. _Be still. Stop fighting. I’ve got you, and you aren’t going anywhere._

“I said let go!” Gaster shouts, driving an elbow back into Grillby’s torso. _That_ blow hits; solid embers surround Grillby’s core, and the sharp point of his elbow greets them quite angrily. Despite that, Grillby doesn’t move at all—he only winces and holds Gaster more tightly, shifting his arms up and away from Gaster’s broken rib. One hand begins to rub firm, soothing circles across his sternum.

 _Breathe slowly,_ Grillby coaxes. _Stop this senseless struggling. It’s over. Jackson’s gone. You don’t have to fight anymore._

“Let go,” Gaster tries again—this time his voice cracks. “Let go, _let go of me,_ please, please you don’t understand—”

_I do. Asgore told me. You need magic, but this is not the way to get it. I will help you._

Gaster shudders, his bones rattling. “No, you can’t help, _nobody_ can help. I need to—I need to kill him, that’s the only way for me to live and it’s the only way to make these fucking thoughts stop, that’s the only way to make things feel right again, don’t you _get it?_ I can’t stop—can’t stop _thinking_ about it, about him, about _hurting him—”_

“Enough,” Grillby says. _Enough. Revenge is not going to bring you any peace or closure, much as you might hope it to. It’s not that easy. Besides, I promised you, didn’t I? As long as I’m around, you’re not going to hurt anyone. I’ll keep you safe._

Him? Grillby’s going to keep _him_ safe? As though _he’s_ the one in danger? Gaster laughs, cracked and watery. “You really don’t get it, you don’t—”

 _I understand what you’re going through—more than I’d like to admit. But I_ also _understand that hurting others is going to hurt you more than anyone else. Jackson? I don’t give a_ fuck _about him. I’d like to see him dead as much as you would, but I_ am not _going to let you hurt him anymore than you already have, because hurting him is hurting yourself. I know you’re scared, I know you feel out of control, I know you’re_ fucking pissed, _but killing him isn’t going to fix things, it’s not going to magically make you feel better, it’s not going to make the thoughts stop—and you know that, too._

“I wanted—I wanted to hurt him so it would stop,” Gaster repeats numbly. His bones begin to rattle in terror. If killing Jackson doesn’t fix this rotten hate in his soul, then he fears nothing can. “I wanted to make it stop. I wanted to feel normal again, wanted—w-wanted it to be over.”

_Oh, Wings. I know, sweetheart, but it’s not that simple. Healing is hard. It hurts. But we are going to be with you every step of the way, no matter how painful or scary it gets. You don’t need anything from Jackson to recover—not revenge, not an explanation, not his magic, not anything._

“No no no I can’t I need—I need—”

 _You are strong enough, my dear._ Grillby leans his head against Gaster’s, and Gaster collapses against his chest. Falling apart feels just as terrible as he thought it would. The world is fracturing again, and he, at the center of it, feels every splintering piece. The only difference is that this time—

This time, he’s the one who shattered it.

The first sob is warped and twisted and reluctant—he buries his face against his hands, his shoulders shaking. Grillby croons quietly, pulling him closer, guiding Gaster to burrow against his chest. “It’s alright,” he whispers as Gaster sobs. “It’s alright, shh, everything is going to be alright. All will be well, I promise. You’ll feel okay again.”

Gaster wants to believe that, _oh how he wants to,_ but he just—

He just doesn’t think it’s true.

Grillby’s hand comes up to cup the back of his neck, squeezing gently. Gaster’s breath comes in ragged gulps, and his vision blurs and fractures through his tears. He’s fucked it up again. Over and over and over—for every step forward, there are a hundred steps back. 

...he thinks of Sisyphus, suddenly, and he cries harder.

He knew he was going to fuck up, didn’t he? But now that he has—now that he has, _stars,_ it hurts. He feels so poisonously helpless. What is he going to do? What _can_ he do? If he can’t kill Jackson, then where the hell does he go from here? Can he just...let himself die? His children—oh, his children! He’s going to leave them, just like his father left him, just like Gaster promised he wouldn’t do, not again, _not ever again._ He trembles violently, curling his fingers into Grillby’s waistcoat. Grillby hushes him softly, running one hand up and down his spine and murmuring aimless comfort. Asgore comes to join them several minutes later, wrapping them both in his arms. He presses his muzzle to the side of Gaster’s skull, and Gaster sobs and sobs and doesn’t push him away.

“Oh, my little one,” Asgore says, his voice broken. “Little, little one. It’s alright. We’ll help you—you don’t need to hurt anyone anymore.”

 _What of Jackson?_ Grillby asks, cradling Gaster’s head protectively against his chest.

“He lives,” Asgore says, and sets a paw on Gaster’s shoulder when he makes a cracked, frustrated noise. “The Judge has been summoned. She’ll execute him as soon as she arrives.”

Gaster renews his struggles upon hearing that, futile and foolish though he knows it is—he could hardly to hope to get away from the both of them, and killing Jackson seems a worthless endeavour now. Still, holding still and accepting that bitter piece of news is an impossibility. There’s too much _fury_ in his chest, too much _fear._ If he gives up now, it will tear him apart. Grillby tightens his grip as Gaster pushes against him, holding Gaster firmly to his chest. Asgore keeps a firm hand on his back, murmuring quiet platitudes.

“It’s better this way,” Asgore insists. “You don’t need to kill him, Wingdings, you don’t. It will not bring you the life you want. You know that.”

“I hate you for this,” Gaster hisses, and Asgore flinches and turns away from him. 

“No you don’t.”

“Stop _telling me how I feel!”_

Asgore takes a deep breath, then stands. “Grillby, we ought to get him out of here. This place isn’t helping his mental state.” The king looks over the surgery table, over the shattered tank that housed Gaster’s worse moments. Anger flashes through his eyes. One of them gleams blue, and Gaster sees the glint of magic around Asgore’s paws. “...isn’t helping _any_ of our mental states.”

Grillby stands, scooping Gaster up and cradling him against his chest. Gaster has half a mind to kick him in the gut and roll out of his arms, but he knows it won’t do him any good. Still, the idea of fighting is...unreasonably appealing. Grillby must see the mutiny in his eyes, because he tightens his grip and offers Gaster a firm look. _Stay._

“I’m not an animal,” Gaster hisses.

 _No,_ Grillby agrees. _You’d be much more manageable if you were an animal._

Offense flashes across Gaster’s face, and Grillby hitches him more securely against his chest before heading out of the basement with Asgore on his heels. They pause at the front door, Grillby flickers a look at Asgore.

_Where to, Your Majesty?_

“The boys are with the dogs, so we can take him back to Snowdin—if, er, you think he’ll behave for that long.”

Gaster scrubs a hand across face, smearing black magic, blood, and tears across his cheeks. Ugh. Disgusting. “No,” he mutters. “Not Snowdin.”

“And where would you suggest, Wingdings?” Asgore asks wearily.

“Take me to the palace.”

“Forgive me, but I’m not quite that much of a fool. You’re not going anywhere near Jackson until he’s dust,” Asgore says, folding his arms across his chest. “Pick somewhere else.”

Gaster growls in frustration. For a moment, he considers simply teleporting to the palace again—but he knows if he tries, he’ll cripple himself for longer than a few minutes. He simply doesn’t have the magic for it. 

_Snowdin,_ Grillby decides for him. _We’re going to my house. Fuku won’t be home from school for some time yet._

So they go to Snowdin. The Riverperson doesn’t speak a word—they don’t even offer a riddle, unusually quiet and somber. When the three of them reach Snowdin, they take the underground tunnels to Grillby’s bar, avoiding as many of the townspeople as they can. Gaster appreciates that, at least. Stars knows he’s humiliated enough without airing it to the public. When they reach Grillby’s house, the elemental swings open the front door and strides inside, but Asgore hesitates on the welcome mat. 

“I need to get be getting back to the palace,” he admits reluctantly when Grillby and Gaster both glance back at him. “I need to be there for the Judge. As a witness, you understand. Can you handle him for a few hours?”

Grillby nods. _I can. Don’t worry—he’ll be settled by the time you return._

Gaster bristles. Grillby doesn’t need to sound so _confident,_ as though he’s dealing with a particularly fussy toddler. Asgore takes his leave, and Gaster immediately begins to squirm in Grillby’s arms. Grillby scowls at him.

 _Enough,_ he signs sharply, heading for the bathroom. He sets Gaster down on the counter, and Gaster hunches over, wrapping his arms around his ribs. Grillby reaches for a washcloth, running it cautiously under the faucet before reaching for Gaster’s face. Gaster leans away, his eyes narrow. Grillby pauses, but he doesn’t move back. _Come here. You’re a mess._

“Stop treating me like a child.”

 _Then stop acting like one._ Grillby waits, unflappably patient, with one eyebrow cocked. Gaster bares his teeth and leans forward again. Grillby carefully wipes the mess from his face, then tosses the washcloth into the laundry. He unbuttons Gaster’s lab coat and peels it off, along with his gloves. _Sit up. I need to look at your ribs. You’re hurt, aren’t you?_

Gaster scrubs a hand across his eyes. “Doesn’t matter. You can’t do anything to fix it.”

 _Arms up._ When Gaster lifts his arms, Grillby plucks his shirt off and tosses it into the laundry, too. He leans forward, studying the crack that runs through Gaster’s sixth rib. It’s a complete fracture, the two pieces held together solely by magic—and waning magic, at that. Grillby tsks, rummaging through his cabinets and pulling out a thick white bandage. _I’ll bandage them to help hold the pieces together, but you’re right—that’s all I can do. Even if I can’t fix a wound for you, Wings, that’s no reason not to tell me about it._

Gaster holds still (although he can’t quite stop the trembles that wrack his bones) as Grillby bandages his broken rib. The pain doesn’t abate, but it does ease, once the two halves of his rib stop grating against each other whenever he moves. He exhales softly, closing his eyes. In the waning of pain, of fear, of _anger,_ he’s...tired again, miserable. Grillby touches his shoulder, then slips out of the room. When he returns, he has an oversized red sweatshirt.

 _Arms up, last time,_ he coaxes. Gaster reluctantly lifts his arms, letting Grillby pull the shirt over his head. Once he’s dressed, Grillby scoops him up again.

“You don’t have to keep doing that, you know,” Gaster murmurs, although he leans his head against Grillby’s chest nonetheless. “I can walk.”

 _I know,_ Grillby says. He carries Gaster into the living room and sets him down on the couch, taking a seat next to him. _Would you like to talk about it?_

“No.”

_I think you need to._

Gaster shrugs, wrapping his arms around himself. Grillby reaches out and, when Gaster doesn’t lean away, loops an arm around his shoulders and draws him close again. Hesitantly, Gaster unfolds his arms and snakes them around Grillby, instead.

 _Talk to me,_ Grillby coaxes, hooking his chin over the top of Gaster’s skull. He slides one hand up to rub the back of Gaster’s neck, and Gaster shivers the tension out of his bones. _Tell me what’s wrong. Let me help._

“You can’t,” Gaster whispers. “Not now, not with this.”

 _That’s a little presumptuous of you, don’t you think? Let’s make that decision together._ He squeezes Gaster gently. _Let me try._

Gaster takes a shuddering breath, closing his eyes. “I want to hurt him,” he says plaintively. “I want to hurt him so _much,_ Grillby. I can’t stop thinking about it. And I don’t just mean like—like—‘I want to punch him because I’m upset’ hurting, I mean really, _really_ hurting. I mean—” He swallows hard. “Sick stuff. Really fucked up stuff.”

Grillby hums quietly, smoothing a hand over the back of his skull. _I hear you,_ he says. _Keep going._

And so Gaster does. Once the first words are out, it’s like shattering a dam. He fears if he stops he’ll never be able to start again. “And—and I don’t think it’s right, thinking shit like that around the boys—what if I snap?” He curls his fingers over his skull, his bones rattling. “What if I hurt someone else? I know I made you promise to keep me from doing stupid shit, but what happens when you’re not around? I’m not a good person, and I know that, but it doesn’t matter. If they tried to take the boys from me because of this, I’d—fuck, I wouldn’t let them. Maybe it would be for the best, but I _can’t,_ I can’t let anyone take them from me again—”

He sucks in a breath, his soul twisting at the very thought of being separated from his children. He knows it isn’t healthy—he knows, and he doesn’t care, and he hates himself for not caring. “On the bright side,” he whispers, “Asgore told you, didn’t he? I won’t be around much longer, now. I shouldn’t fuck anything up too badly, but the boys—oh, what’s going to happen to them when I die? Who’s going to take care of them? Papyrus has already been through so much, I just don’t know how well he’ll take to another provider; he’s bound to have attachment issues already. And Sans—”

His voice cracks. He hugs himself, and Grillby’s arms tighten around him. His baby boys, his _babies._ He’s going to be torn away from them, no matter what he does, no matter how hard he fights.

“I don’t want to leave them,” he whispers. His eyelights flicker. “I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to die. I’m so afraid, Grillby. It feels like every time I take a step forward, something drags me back, like I’ll never get ahead of this, like I’m always going to be _struggling_ and _hurting_ and _afraid._ And I know you said it feels like that sometimes, like it gets worse when it should be getting better, but I just—what if it never gets better? What if I never make it to the top before I die? It seems like such a waste of precious time. I want to _enjoy_ what life I have left, not spend it all just trying to keep my head above the water!”

 _My dear._ Grillby presses his forehead to Gaster’s temple. _Oh, my dear. You aren’t going to die anytime soon, and it will get better, and you will enjoy a long and happy life with your children._

“Stop. Please. Don’t give me false hope if you’re just trying to—”

 _I’m_ serious. _Look at me._ Grillby says, taking Gaster by the shoulders and turning him gently. Gaster blinks, his eyelights flickering back into his sockets. _I’ve been doing some research. I meant what I said earlier, about helping you. You don’t need Jackson’s magic; you’ve got me._

Gaster laughs miserably. “Oh, Grillby. Ordinarily that would make anything better, and I do appreciate your confidence, but—”

 _Listen! My god, you’d think you could listen better than a deaf elemental could, but that’s never been the case, has it? You’re a_ dragon!

“Well—well, perhaps there are few draconic genes involved, but I don’t see what that has to do with—”

 _You’re a dragon and_ I’m _an elemental. We can—_

Gaster’s eyes widen, and he sits up straighter as the idea occurs to him. “Oh my god. Do you mean—?”

_—share magic! Just like the old dragons and elementals used to. It’s ancient magic, and I’ve only a vague idea of how the ritual goes, but I think if you gave me a little more time, I could figure it out. My family has history books, ritual books, folk tales—_

Gaster glances away, choking back the hope that threatens to rise in his chest. “But I’m hardly an ordinary dragon, by all accounts. Who knows if I’m even the right species? I can’t be more than a half-breed. Without genetic testing—”

 _Then we’ll do the genetic testing. If there’s even a_ possibility, _Wings—_

“Yes, yes, of course I’ll look into it. But even if—even if we could, I’d feel awful taking something like that from you.”

 _What?_ Grillby goes still, his flames flinching back. _Why? Am I—do you not approve—_

“No, no, nothing like that!” Gaster reaches forward, cupping Grillby’s face in his hands. “You’re wonderful, dear, perfectly wonderful. It’s only that if you share your magic with me, you’ll—you’ll die faster, won’t you?”

 _Perhaps, but not nearly as fast as you’re dying now. I’m powerful, Wings. I’ve killed people. I’ve killed humans. My stats are far higher than I need them to be. Besides, I’ve only one child, and she got most of the magic she needed to grow when her mother died. The doctor doubts she’ll resume taking magic from me until she’s an adult. I’ve got at least two hundred years left; I doubt sharing some with you will take more than fifty years off of that. Besides, for you—_ He leans forward, touching their foreheads. _For you, my dear, anything. If you’ll have me, I could think of no use more honorable for this old magic of mine._

And Gaster’s—crying again, why is he crying again—? “Oh, jeez, Grillby. How I am supposed to say no—” He scrubs his eyes across his elbow, his breath wobbling. “—to something like that?”

 _You don’t._ Grillby leans their foreheads together, gently taking Gaster’s hands and enfolding them within his own. _Not unless, I mean—not unless you really don’t want—_

“I want,” Gaster assures him. “Of course I want—I want to _live,_ I want to stay with the boys, I want to stay with _you—_ how stupid would I have to be to say no to an opportunity like this?”

 _Not stupid,_ Grillby chasties gently. _It’s your choice. If you don’t feel comfortable—_

Gaster laughs, watery and weak but genuinely _happy._ “I told you, silly,” he says, thunking their heads together. _“Yes._ If we can make it happen, then—yes, of course.”

Delight sprawls across Grillby’s face, warm and yellow and bright. A wide, jagged smile chases it, and he squeezes Gaster’s hands before dragging him into a hug. For a moment, in spite of everything, Gaster is content. Hopeful, even. Sore and exhausted and _hopeful._ He clings to that feeling as long as he can.

A few minutes later, Asgore calls to tell them Jackson is dead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haPPY EGG DAY IF U CELEBRATE !!!!!
> 
> also super fun fact: the carotid !!! its that big ole artery you can palpate in your neck! b u t you should never palpate both carotid arteries at once—dont try it dont. if u do palpate both at once u pass out !! this is not, however, because you’re cutting off blood flow to the brain. there’s lots of different pathways to the brain so that doesnt matter so much, esp for just a few seconds. u pass out because there are baroreceptors in your carotid that detect the pressure of your blood against your arterial walls. if u press ur fingers against the arterial walls ur brain goes ‘hey wait thats too much pressure on both sides !! we must have high blood pressure !! oh no !!’ and then it tells ur heart ‘hey friend less pressure please’ and ur heart is like ‘u got it my dude less pressure comin right up’ and stops pumping your blood so hard so your blood pressure drops dramatically and u pass out !! #physiologyiscool pass it on


	31. perseverance was his name

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to death/violence/torture/child abuse/neglect/abandonment, trust issues, self-loathing
> 
> "I am not only a thing, but also a way of being—one of many ways—and knowing the paths I have followed and the ones left to take will help me understand what I am becoming.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes
> 
> aaaaaaa we have some !! absolutely lovely art this chapter!!! [here](https://purropurro.tumblr.com/post/615500220363571200/some-fanart-for-parsnipit-s-fic-algernon-paps) we have gaster and paps snuggling and stealing my h e a r t, and [here](https://purropurro.tumblr.com/post/615600151127539712/tap-tap-more-fanart-for-parsnipit-s-fic-right) we have a very ominous gaster, both thanks to @purropurro on tumblr!! thank you so much again ;aldkgjd;!!!

Looking at Jackson’s dust feels like closing a book. It was a simple kill: clean, quick, nothing at all like Gaster wanted it. The Judge had snapped his neck—all those delicate vertebrae never stood a chance. Asgore allows him to look on Jackson’s dust for almost ten minutes, at Grillby’s urging.  _ Jackson is dead,  _ Grillby had insisted when Asgore began to protest,  _ and I want Wings to know that and know it well. Let him look. _

So Gaster looks, and he knows Jackson’s death well. Grillby and Asgore were right—this death isn’t satisfying, and it doesn’t make him happy. If anything, it saps him of what little energy he has left. His eyelights dull. His shoulders slump. The Judge sits behind him, then gently reaches out a wing and rests it against his back. 

“I find no joy in a death, however well-deserved it was,” she says quietly. “I do, however, take some measure of comfort in knowing that this death has ensured what happened to you and your children will never happen again. You can rest easy now, Dr. Gaster.”

He glances wearily at her and makes no reply. She takes her leave after a brief word with Asgore, and it is with a weary, numb soul that Gaster allows Grillby and Asgore to lead him back to Snowdin. They enter Gaster’s house quietly, and Gaster turns and shuts the door behind them with a soft  _ click.  _

_ I’ll make something to drink,  _ Grillby says, heading for the kitchen.  _ You two talk. _

It doesn’t sound like a request. Gaster and Asgore regard each other uncertainly for a moment. Then Asgore clears his throat, snagging the throw blanket off of the back of the couch and draping it around Gaster’s shoulders. “Here,” he says. “You’re shivering.”

...is he? He glances down at his hands. They tremble faintly. 

“Sit down.” Asgore sets a hand on his shoulder, guiding him to sit on the couch and taking a seat beside him. He exhales softly, scrubbing a paw between his horns. The silence stretches between them, painful and awkward. “I—Wingdings, I—”

“I did what you said,” Gaster says. “You can’t be mad at me for that. I told you what I wanted, what I was feeling, I didn’t hide it. I tried. I tried lots of times.”

“You didn’t tell me everything. You didn’t tell me you were dying so soon.”

“I was going to fix it, so it wasn’t a concern you should have had to deal with.”

“It was  _ important.” _

“Would you have let me kill him, if you knew?” Gaster shakes his head. “No. You  _ didn’t  _ let me kill him, even after you found out why I needed his magic.”

“No, but if you had communicated with me earlier—if you had communicated with  _ Grillby!— _ perhaps you never would have had to come up with such an outrageous plan in the first place. We came up with a much better solution because we worked together. You can’t just offer us pieces of the truth because you think you always know best.”

“I tried to do what you said,” Gaster repeats unhappily. “I talked to you. Maybe it wasn’t about every little detail, but I talked to you.”

Asgore groans, rubbing his face. “...I know. I appreciate that. We’ve got a long ways to go yet, but...I appreciate that.”

“And you still didn’t help me.”

“I _did_ help you, just not the way you wanted. Again, you don’t always know best, and that’s okay. You just have to be willing to listen—to really, actually consider someone else’s ideas instead of doggedly refusing to even consider their opinions in favor of shoving your own down their throat because you’re so much _smarter_ than everyone. Besides, sometimes my helping you is going to be saying _no._ I’m sorry if that makes you unhappy.”

“You don’t usually tell me no.”

“You don’t usually make such faulty choices.”

“It didn’t seem like a faulty choice at the time.”

“They rarely do.”

“But you weren’t considering  _ my  _ opinion seriously, either.”

Asgore opens his mouth, then hesitates. “...no, you’re right. I wasn’t. And I know that must have been frustrating for you, to feel so unheard after I encouraged you to come to me with anything.”

“It was frustrating.” Gaster’s shoulders relax minutely. “Of course, I was trying to manipulate you throughout most of our conversations, so I can’t say I blame you for not wanting to listen. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too. I’ll try to listen better next time. But—how do you feel now? Do you still think you were right to...do what you did?”

Gaster drums his fingers together, clicking his teeth as he thinks. “I think, given the information I had at the time, that I was right to want to kill him. I will admit that hurting him the way I did was unnecessary, although I don’t feel sorry for it. Er, well, that’s not quite true. I feel guilty, but only because I know I hurt you, and because I don’t want you to think of me as a bad person and I’m afraid you do now.”

“You were going to torture him. You  _ did  _ torture him.”

“Yes. I didn’t feel anything when I did.”

Asgore takes a deep, shuddering breath. “What did you want to feel?”

“I just—” Gaster spreads his hands helplessly. “I wanted it to stop. I wanted to stop thinking about him. I wanted to make him hurt the way he hurt me, the way he hurt my children. That seemed like justice. An eye for an eye, you know?”

“Hurting someone because they hurt you, that’s—Wingdings, it’s just letting them turn you into the same kind of person they were. I didn’t  _ care  _ what happened to Jackson. I wasn’t arguing with you because I cared about  _ Jackson. _ I did it for you. I didn’t want you to let that bastard turn you into the same cold, sadistic creature he was, but—”

“He did.”

Asgore rubs the back of his neck, bowing his head and turning his face from Gaster.

“Do you think I’m evil? For hurting him?”

“I think you’re very upset, and very confused, and very liable to turn into a person you don’t want to be if you aren’t careful.”

“...so, evil?”

“No, Wingdings, not evil. Just foolish and angry. We aren’t going to let it get any further than that. Besides, you’ve never thought about hurting anyone but Jackson.” Asgore glances back in his direction. There’s an aching fear in his eyes. “Right?”

Gaster shakes his head adamantly. “No. No, I never want to hurt anyone else that way,” he says, and it’s the truth—thank  _ god,  _ it’s the truth. “I never have. It was just—just him. What he represented. I thought if I hurt him, I would feel better. I would stop being so angry.”

“And?”

“I mean, I don’t want to hurt him anymore, but I think that’s because he’s dead now and kicking a pile of dust is too messy. I’m still—really angry. I still feel gross and upset and scared.”

Asgore rests a hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently. “I’m sorry. It  _ will  _ get better.”

“I know—at least  _ logically  _ I know, even if sometimes it doesn’t feel that way. It’s just slower than I’d like it to be, and a great deal more difficult.”

“Five years.”

Gaster casts a curious glance at Asgore.

“It was five years after Asriel died and Toriel left me that I woke up in the morning and even so much as  _ thought  _ that my happiness could be more than temporary. That was when I—well, not when I found my new normal, but when I accepted it, when I discovered a future in it and stopped yearning so very much for the past. That’s not to say everything was perfect after that. Far from it, actually, but it was easier.”

“Five years feels like forever.”

“It won’t be a bad five years,” Asgore assures him. “They’ll be the hardest years, and they will hurt, and your bad days will be quite bad—but there is still plenty of happiness to be found, especially with a family and friends like yours.”

“Yeah. I am pretty lucky when it comes to family and friends, aren’t I?” He flickers Asgore a tired (but no less genuine) smile. “Thanks, Asgore. Really.”

“Of course.” Asgore holds his arm out, inviting Gaster to curl against his broad side. “Come here, little one?”

Gaster cuddles up against him, resting his head against Asgore’s shoulder as the king’s arm comes down to hug him close. He breathes deeply, tries to settle the weary trembling in his bones with the smell of golden flower tea and goat fur. Asgore fusses with the blanket around his shoulders, gently rearranging it before smoothing a hand down his back.

“Are you going to punish me?” Gaster asks after a moment, fiddling with the frayed edge of the blanket. “I went against your orders. I tried to kill someone.”

“Do you feel like you should be punished?”

“Not for trying to kill him. That was legal and logical. But—” He trails off, humming quietly. “I didn’t have to hurt him.”

“No, you didn’t. That was cruel of you.”

“I know. Logically, I know that, and I think I should feel bad? I just...don’t.”

“And you think my punishing you would fix that? Would give you your guilt back?”

Gaster shrugs helplessly. “I don’t know that I care that much about feeling guilty or not where Jackson’s concerned, but if it makes  _ you  _ feel better to punish me, I won’t fight you about it. Just—don’t take me from my children. I couldn’t stand it.”

“...no,” Asgore decides quietly. “I won’t punish you. It wouldn’t do any good. It wouldn’t make you sorry, nor do I think you need any sort of deterrent to keep you from doing something like this again. I suppose you’ll just have to live with my disappointment as your only punishment.”

“That’s worst of all.”

“I know.” Asgore squeezes him close, but will not meet his eyes. Gaster swallows hard, pulling the blanket more tightly around himself. After a moment of silence, Asgore asks, “Does it really bother you?”

“Does what bother me?”

“My calling you ‘little one?’”

“What? Why would that bother me?”

“You acted as though it bothered you, earlier. I don’t mean to belittle you by it.”

“No, I know, I know. I just said that because I was—” Gaster flails a hand weakly. “Upset? Looking for something to bitch about? It doesn’t usually bother me. Promise.”

Asgore chuckles, nuzzling across the top of Gaster’s skull. “Alright, then, little one.”

Grillby steps into the living room a few seconds later, three mugs of steaming hot chocolate in his hands. Gaster accepts his mug, cupping it between the remnants of his palms and letting it warm the bone through. 

“Delicious, as always,” Asgore says after a sip. “I don’t know how you do it, Grillby.”

_ Years of practice, sire. Wings, you’re not drinking. _

“Mm, I’ll throw up if I try, but thank you.”

_ I’ll make you something light for dinner. _

“Oh, no, you really don’t have to. I’m sure you have plans.”

_ Had.  _ Had _ plans, Wings. I changed them all the moment I found out you were off trying to save your own life through the means of unnecessary homicide—which, by the way.  _ Grillby looks sharply at him.  _ If you ever decline to tell me that you’re dying again, I will be very upset with you. Actually, I  _ am  _ very upset with you, but I’m letting you off the hook for the moment being because you look so damned miserable. _

Gaster smiles sheepishly at him, hunching his shoulders. “Sorry.”

_ You’d better be. I am not pleased with your behavior as of late, and we will be discussing it very soon. _

Gaster feels very much like a child being scolded, and he winces apologetically before busying himself with an intense study of the hot chocolate in his mug. Grillby and Asgore finish their drinks, and Grillby whisks all three mugs back to the kitchen. When he returns, he has a glass of water, and he pushes it unrepentantly into Gaster’s hands.

_ Drink this instead,  _ he says,  _ and come with me. You need to sleep. _

“The boys, I’d like to have the boys here,” Gaster says, standing and tapping his fingers nervously on his glass. “They’ve been with the Dogi for a while. They’re probably worried.”

_ As they have every right to be. Asgore will go and fetch them. _

Asgore nods, standing and heading for the door. “I’ll be back with them in just a few minutes, don’t you worry. Go on upstairs and rest.”

So Gaster trudges upstairs after Grillby, setting his glass down on his bedside table before flopping down on his mattress. Stars, there really is no place like home. He burrows underneath his blankets, shoving his head beneath his pillow and sighing in contentment. Grillby taps his back, and he peeks out.

_ Drink. You’ll be dehydrated. _

Gaster whines, but when Grillby sets his hands on his hips and gives him A Look, he grudgingly begins to sip at the water. Grillby nods his approval, heading for the door. 

_ I’ll be back in time for dinner,  _ he says, resting his hand on the doorframe.  _ I’ll bring over the books on dragons I’ve found, too, so we can begin researching the linking rituals. Stay out of trouble until then, alright? _

Gaster flashes him a thumbs-up. Several minutes later, he hears the downstairs door swing open again, and then the stomp of boots and the skitter of tiny paws on the stairs. Sans bursts through the bedroom door first, launching himself into Gaster’s arms. Gaster laughs, sitting up and hugging him close. Papyrus hesitates next to the bed, shifting his weight uncertainly until Gaster reaches down and scoops him up. With the weight of his children in his arms, safe and sound, something warm and soft finally begins to flicker back into his soul.

“Hello, boys,” he says, squeezing them both gently. “I missed you.”

“Hey, old man.” Sans leans back against his chest, burying himself under the blankets with Gaster. “You were gone  _ forever.  _ What happened?”

Gaster takes a deep breath. The stairs creak outside, and when he glances up, Asgore stands in the doorway. He offers Gaster an encouraging nod, so Gaster steadies himself as best he can and says, “I’ve got to tell you something.” He clicks his teeth, and he feels Sans tense against him. He finishes in a rush, like tearing off a bandage; no point in drawing things out: “Jackson is dead.”

“Oh.”

Gaster...isn’t sure if that’s a good  _ oh  _ or a bad  _ oh.  _ “Oh?”

“You—did you—?”

“No, no no, not me,” Gaster rushes to assure him. Sans relaxes in his arms, however minutely. “The Judge did it.”

“Okay.”

“Okay? Is that—are you happy? Are you upset?”

Sans shrugs. “I’m—I don’t know. It’s good, I guess. I’m glad he didn’t have to sit around and keep waiting to die. I’m glad he can’t hurt anyone else. I’m glad we’re safe. What about you? Are  _ you  _ upset?”

Gaster pauses, as though mulling the question over briefly. “I...suppose so, but it’s nothing that won’t heal with time.” With time and a fuck-ton of therapy. “You know you can tell me if it  _ does  _ bother you, right?”

Sans glances at his hands, rubbing his fingers together. “Yeah,” he says, after a long moment. “I know, Dad. Thanks. I just need to think about for a little while, I think.”

“Alright. It is pretty big news to process, huh? Hey, but I’ve got even more exciting news than that.”

“Really?”

“Mm-hm. Grillby and I are going to be doing a little bit of research about dragons tonight. Would you like to help us?”

“Yeah!” 

And that’s...that. One book closed, and another opened. One enemy dead, and a hoard of traumas in his wake. Life moves on, and Gaster staggers after it, as he always has. He perseveres. Asgore tells them all goodbye, and then Gaster flops over and has a good damned nap with a son nestled on either side of him. He wakes a couple of hours later and sits up, groggily wiping his eyes. When the memory of Jackson hits him, his hands begin to shake, but his soul stays precariously numb. Papyrus warbles curiously at him, lifting his head from the pillows.

“Hey, bud,” he says, reaching out to ruffle a hand gently over Papyrus’ skull. Sans still snoozes next to them, curled into a small ball beneath the blankets. Gaster tucks the blankets in around his shoulders, then stands and stretches. Once he’s rolled the kinks out of his bones, he scoops Papyrus into his arms and carries him down into the kitchen. He sets his son down on the counter, then folds his arms across his chest and clicks his teeth thoughtfully. “We should do something for Asgore and Grillby, huh?”

Papyrus mouths uncertainly at the sink faucet. Gaster takes this as an agreement.

“Well, Grillby’s got dinner covered, but whoever said no to cookies, right?” he asks, pulling his phone out to look up a recipe. Cookies are hardly an apology enough for everything he’s put them through, but they seem a fair start. 

Papyrus sits on the counter and watches, head cocked, as Gaster goes about pulling out ingredients. Gaster tries to explain everything as he does it (although cooking has never been a science he particularly enjoyed), eager for any opportunity to introduce Papyrus to new words and concepts. Papyrus listens as intently as he ever does, eyelights sharp and focused on Gaster’s movements. Gaster waits until the first batch of cookies (chocolate-chip, nice and classic) have cooled some before offering him one.

“Here,” he says, breaking off a small piece and holding it out. “This is a cookie. It’s good—er, well. In  _ theory  _ it’s good. Grillby could probably do better. You’ll have to try his, someday soon.”

Papyrus tentatively takes the cookie from him. “‘kie,” he says, softly.

“Did you just talk?” Gaster whispers. “Cookie? Cookie, Papyrus?”

Papyrus blinks at him.

“Ooooh my stars, Papyrus, c’mon, you can do it. Cookie? Can you say cookie? Say cookie for Daddy?”

Instead, Papyrus begins fastidiously scraping melted chocolate off of his teeth with a forepaw. Even so, Gaster can’t help the wide grin that sprawls across his face. His son  _ spoke!  _ He spoke in—in Wingdings! Gaster knows he shouldn’t be so thrilled about that (how much better it would be for him to know Common!) but by the  _ stars,  _ he’d been worried Papyrus would never speak. Given his unfortunate upbringing, it wouldn’t have been a surprise. Even now, Gaster knows it will probably take him longer than any other child to learn how to communicate verbally (stars know it took Gaster himself much longer than normal to learn), but what a relief it is to know he can mimic. 

“Good job, buddy,” he says, beaming at Papyrus. Papyrus hums thoughtfully and glances away from him, but he doesn’t seem displeased. Once Gaster has finished his cookies, he sets them all out on the cooling rack and washes his hands. Upon staring at the gleaming soap bubbles on his fingers, he realizes he feels...gross. He feels dusty, even though he never so much as  _ touched  _ Jackson’s dust, and he had gloves on before that. Still, his joints feel gritty and his bones feel oily and his soul feels…

Point being, he feels filthy, and he suddenly very desperately wants a shower and a change of clothes. Speaking of clothes—he lifts each foot in turn, peering at the underside of his sneakers. Thank the stars, there’s no blood on the soles or tracked across the floors. Leaving the cookies to cool, he leads the way back upstairs with Papyrus on his heels. He sets the child on the bed next to Sans, then points at him.

“Stay here, please,” he says. “Don’t get into too much trouble. I’ll be back in just a few minutes.”

Papyrus circles, then lays down and props his chin on Sans’ side. That settled, Gaster leaves the bedroom—shutting the door carefully behind him and checking the baby gate at the top of the stairs, just in case—before ducking into the bathroom. He showers with the water as hot as it can go, scrubbing his bones vigorously with soap before rinsing off. Once rinsed, he suds and scrubs again. Rinse, wash, rinse, wash, rinse, wash, repeat repeat repeat. 

...it doesn’t make him feel any cleaner. 

Shuddering violently (the water’s run cold), he slaps the faucet off and steps out of the shower to dry himself. He considers tossing his old clothes into the laundry, but upon second thought, he drops them into the trash—save for Grillby’s sweatshirt, which he carefully folds and sets aside. After yanking on a clean pair of sweats and his softest brown sweater, he heads back to his bedroom. Papyrus warbles a soft greeting, and Sans blinks sleepily at him.

“Good morning, sleepyhead,” Gaster says, taking a seat on the edge of the bed.

“‘s afternoon, isn’t it?”

“You’ve got me there. Grillby will be back for dinner soon, and I made cookies.”

_ That  _ gets Sans’ eyelights brightening. “Cookies? What kind?”

“Chocolate chip.”

“Mmm. When can we eat them?”

“After dinner, although—” Gaster winks at him. “I won’t tell your dad if you sneak one now.”

Sans grins, rolling out of bed and making a beeline for the stairs. Gaster makes the bed, then heads down after him and decidedly does not notice when there’s a cookie missing from the tray. True to form, Grillby shows up at 6:00 PM sharp in an ironed gray suit with a box full of old books. Fuku comes with him, her arms full of tupperware dishes. Their conversation over dinner is thankfully unstilted, and the children keep it light-hearted. Papyrus sits uncertainly in Gaster’s lap, leaning back against him and side-eyeing Grillby and Fuku as they eat—but he doesn’t seem distressed, only unsure, and Gaster can hardly blame him for that. 

After dinner, Gaster presents his cookies with a grin (a grin he may have to try a little too hard for, he thinks—he can’t meet Grillby’s eyes for very long). The children fall ravenously upon them, and Grillby politely takes one and munches on it. If it’s garbage, he doesn’t say so. Gaster nibbles hesitantly on one of them, himself. It’s too dry, bordering on the edge of oversalted, but it’s not terrible. Not good, not bad, just—somewhere in between.

Gaster thinks that’s pretty fitting.

After dinner, Gaster and Grillby clean up while the children move into the living room. Gaster washes the dishes, and Grillby dries them with a quick flash of heat from the palms of his hands. Once the dishes have all been put away, Gaster heads back towards the living room—but Grillby catches his shoulder before he gets far.

_ We need to talk. _

Gaster winces, but he supposes avoiding it is only going to make it worse. He’s lucky Grillby even gave him the afternoon. “Right. You’re...right. Outside?”

Grillby nods, turning on heel and heading out. Gaster pokes his head around the living room corner to tell the children “we’ll be outside” and “don’t destroy anything please and thank you”—then he slinks to Grillby’s side. Snow trickles from the sky, fat flakes littering the ground in front of them. They evaporate as they near Grillby, but several land on Gaster’s sweater and cling there. 

“Asgore already scolded me,” Gaster says, when Grillby doesn’t break his silence. “For...everything.”

_ What’s everything? _

So Gaster explains their conversation, and Grillby nods his quiet approval. “So,” Gaster finishes, finally, “if it would make you feel better to scold me for all of that again, you may, but it’s not particularly necessary.”

_ No,  _ Grillby agrees,  _ it isn’t. I’m angry about all of that, of course, but I don’t want to beat a dead horse—how about this? Tell me why, Wings, you refused to tell me what you were planning for Jackson. _

Gaster sighs shakily. “...ah. That.”

_ Yes. You made me promise to keep from hurting anyone, and then you—you— _ An angry red flicker rolls through Grillby’s flames.  _ Explain. You had reasons. You had to have reasons. _

“I was angry. I  _ am  _ angry. I’m so angry, Grillby, you know that, we’ve been over that, and I was afraid I couldn’t control it. I was so afraid. I kept having these thoughts—thinking about hurting Jackson, about killing him, and I just didn’t know if it would stop there. Was all that anger  _ just  _ for Jackson, or would it reach everyone if I lost it? That’s why I asked you to make sure I didn’t hurt anyone,” Gaster says. “I couldn’t have lived with myself if I hurt anyone else just because I was angry at Jackson.”

_ But you did. _

“What? No. No, I never—”

_ Oh, not  _ physically, Grillby spits,  _ but you hurt me. You hurt Asgore. You hurt us badly. _

Gaster shrinks into himself, his soul writhing. “I didn’t mean to. I didn’t want to. I just—I knew you both wouldn’t want me to kill Jackson. You’re too good. You’re too nice.”

_ So you lied to me. Again. _

“No! I didn’t lie,” Gaster snaps. “I never lied to you, I don’t lie to you, not anymore. I omitted information, that’s true, but that’s not a lie.”

_ Your morals leave much to be desired. _

“I know. Fuck, I know that. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I am who I am. I’m sorry I’ve become who I’ve become. I told you you wouldn’t like it. I told you you’d be disappointed, I told you, I told—!”

_ Enough!  _ Grillby’s flames flare, and Gaster snaps his mouth shut and glares, instead. Slowly, Grillby exhales a waft of bleak gray smoke.  _...you were right. I  _ am  _ disappointed. My blind faith in you does cost me dearly, over and over and over again. _

“So why haven’t you given up yet?”

_ Because I love you. Stars help me, do I love you.  _ Grillby scrubs his hands over his face, his shoulders slumping.

“I love you too, you know that! I didn’t do this to hurt you. I did it because I—I didn’t think there was a better way. I did it because I wanted to hurt Jackson, yes, but I also did it because I wanted to  _ live.” _

_ I can’t begrudge you that, but if you had spoken to me, if you had  _ trusted  _ me, I would have provided you with a better solution. That’s just it, though, isn’t it? That’s the crux of all our problems. You don’t trust me. You’ve never trusted me. _

Gaster glances away. The snow glitters harshly at him. “...please don’t take it personally.”

_ No. I don’t. Because it’s not just me, is it? You don’t trust anyone. I don’t think you ever have. _

“Probably not,” Gaster admits quietly. “Not really. Not completely. The world’s not a safe place, you know? And people are—I want to believe that people are good, I really, really do, and I think most of them probably are. But I also know that people, even my favorite people, make mistakes, so it’s better to be prepared for that eventuality. Do you think that makes me a bad person?”

Grillby holds his silence for a long moment, studying the dark fog that rolls high overhead.  _ No,  _ he decides, finally.  _ I don’t think it makes you a bad person. It’s rational for you. Your fear is how you’ve learned to survive, and stars know it must be a thousand times worse now. But it does make our relationship—your relationships in general—more complicated. Doesn’t it stress you out? Never knowing if you’ll be able to rely on someone? _

Gaster reaches out, resting a hand on Grillby’s shoulder and offering him a small smile.  _ I know I can rely on you in most everything, Grillby. I know I can rely on your to run your bar, to make me damned good fries at lunch, to protect my children with everything you have, to be there when I need you and to want what you think is best for me, even if that’s not necessarily what  _ I  _ think is best for me. I trust you in most things, and that’s more than can be said for almost anyone else. I’m sorry I can’t trust you in everything all the time, but that’s just not who I am. I don’t know if I’ll  _ ever  _ be someone that trusting. Whether I am able to trust you in everything or not, though, you must know that my mistrust is never  _ because _ of you.  _

_ I know. I know that, logically, but— _ Grillby lets out a shaky breath, rubbing the back of his neck.  _ It feels like it’s because of me. It feels like  _ I’m  _ the one who’s done something wrong. Every time you don’t communicate with me, every time you do something drastic without telling me, I feel like you’re punishing me for something and I’ve no idea what.  _

“That’s not true,” Gaster says firmly, squeezing Grillby’s shoulder. “It’s never your fault, and I’m so sorry if I’ve ever made you feel like it was.”

Grillby reaches up, resting his hand over Gaster’s. A tiny smile flickers over his face, and Gaster’s soul does something warm and fuzzy—then Grillby’s smile breaks, and Gaster’s soul breaks with it. Molten tears rim Grillby’s eyes behind his glasses, and Gaster makes a pained, helpless noise and reaches for his face.

“Hey—hey, no, I’m sorry, Grillby I’m so sorry, really—”

_ It’s so  _ hard,  _ Wings, it’s so hard feeling like this all the time—feeling like you don’t trust me, feeling like you’re going behind my back—I don’t want to be suspicious of you, I don’t, but I  _ am!  _ I never know what you’re thinking. Sometimes I feel like I don’t know you at all. I worry about you so much. I’m always afraid you’re off getting into trouble, getting yourself hurt. I couldn’t stand it if I lost you again! _

Gaster wraps his arms around Grillby’s shoulders, hugging him tightly, and Grillby buries his face against Gaster’s neck. Hot tears splatter against his sweater, leaving tiny burnt patches. Grillby cries like he does everything else—quietly. His hands come up to grip the back of Gaster’s sweater, and Gaster leans his cheek against his head and makes tiny, sympathetic noises. 

“It’s okay,” he whispers, even though it’s really, really not and Grillby can’t hear him anyways. “It’s okay, shhh, sweetheart, it’s okay. I’m not leaving you behind again, not for a long, long, long time. I’m here. I’m here, hush, I’m right here and I’m not going anywhere.”

Grillby shivers against him, breathing in choppy gasps and plumes of black, grief-stricken smoke. His fingers grasp desperately Gaster’s back, his shoulders shaking. Tears sting at Gaster’s own eyes, but he blinks them furiously away—it’s  _ his  _ fault Grillby is feeling so miserable, after all. He has no right to cry about it. Instead, he continues to murmur aimless comfort, clicking his teeth across Grillby’s temple in tiny skeleton kisses. He rubs a hand soothingly up and down Grillby’s back, and slowly, slowly his elemental begins to steady again. 

“That’s it,” Gaster says, scratching his fingers through the tiny licks of flame near the nape of Grillby’s neck. “That’s it, there we go, you’re alright.  _ We’re _ alright. And I’m gonna keep it that way, okay? I’ll—I’ll be better. I swear I’ll be better for you.”

For a minute or two, Grillby remains in Gaster’s arms, taking slow, shaky breaths. Then he pulls back, pushing his glasses up and swiping at his eyes before looking pointedly at Gaster’s hands. Gaster lifts them, and he signs along as he says, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know it’s hard for you. I know it’s  _ been  _ hard for you, and I don’t—I don’t know how to fix it. I can promise to try and get better about talking to you, about trusting you, but I can’t blame you for not trusting me right now. It’s okay. It’s okay to be disappointed, to be upset, to be mad.”

_ I don’t want to be mad at you,  _ Grillby says, his shoulders slumping.  _ I hate being mad at you so often. _

“Well, I don’t like it much more, but I know when I deserve it,” Gaster says. “Besides, you deserve the right to be angry, too. You don’t have to forgive me right now if you can’t. I understand.”

_...I’ll stop being mad eventually. _

Gaster chuckles softly. “Take your time.”

_ Don’t ever do something like that again. _

“I won’t,” Gaster says, and he fully believes it. Jackson was an exception, and one Gaster is going to make sure he never has the misfortune of enduring again. “I can promise that.”

_ Good.  _ Grillby leans into his arms again, rubbing his cheek posessively against Gaster’s and sighing.  _ You bastard. _

That’s fair enough, Gaster thinks. Grillby draws back from him eventually. For a moment, he hesitates, as though he’s going to say something else—then he seems to think better of it, glancing back at the house. 

_ We should go in,  _ he says.  _ The kids will get curious. _

“Don’t they always?” Gaster asks, wry, as he props the front door open for Grillby. Grillby smooths his button-up out, takes a deep breath, and leads the way inside. Sans casts a suspicious glance at them when they enter, but he’s quickly distracted when Grillby heads for the box of books in the corner. Gaster’s curiosity, too, is instantly piqued, and although he can’t quite rid himself of the guilt ever-present in his chest, at least he can distract himself from it.

“Are those the dragon books?” Sans asks, taking a seat next to Grillby on the floor.

_ They are.  _ Grillby gently lifts one, handing it to him.  _ Would you like to read through them with us? _

“Oh heck yeah!”

Gaster takes a seat next to the box of books, snagging one of his own and opening to the first page. He finds himself almost immediately enthralled—this is a subject he knows very little about, and all the information is new and exciting (albeit mostly useless). The three of them pore over the pages for a couple of hours, sprawled out on the living room floor.

“So,” Sans says, leaning back against the arm of the couch with a ritual book propped in his lap, “it looks like you’ve got at least  _ some  _ dragon DNA, right, Dad? I mean, everything we’re seeing says only dragons have wings. Blasters don’t.”

“That seems to be the case,” Gaster says, holding a bottle carefully as Papyrus suckles it. “I wish we had more information on blasters, but I suppose that wasn’t an elemental priority.”

_ No,  _ Grillby agrees.  _ I never heard about blasters in the old stories. The first time I ever saw one was on the battlefield. _

“Did they fight in the war? The blasters?” Sans asks.

_ Oh, yes. They were extremely valuable allies. _

“But dragons were dead a long time before that.”

Grillby inclines his head. 

_ They were some of the first monsters to go extinct,  _ Fuku adds.

“So how can Dad be related to them? He’s old, but not  _ that  _ old.”

“A fantastic question,” Gaster says, sighing. “There’s only one thing I can think—my father was a more mysterious man than I imagined him to be, and I imagined him as pretty damn well mysterious.”

“You think your dad was a  _ dragon?”  _

Gaster spreads his hands helplessly. “I guess? Or was related to one, in any case. I don’t know how else it would have entered the bloodline. I mean, perhaps it was on my mother’s side, but it makes more sense for it to be on my father’s side. That’s why he could afford to have so many children. If dragons were as powerful as you say, Grillby, then a clutch of nine wouldn’t have taxed him the way it did my mother—hence, I suppose, why I still inherited so much magic from him despite the fact I was one of his youngest children.”

“Well, I guess he did draw dragons. That’s kind of suspicious,” Sans admits. “Oh! Grillby, did Dad show you that?”

_ Show me what? _

Sans races upstairs, and Papyrus gurgles his protest through a mouthful of milk. Aforementioned milk splatters all over one of Grillby’s priceless and ancient history books, and Gaster groans and dabs it up with a corner of the blanket. “Sorry, Grillby.”

_ That’s okay,  _ Grillby says, crackling quietly in amusement.  _ Better than sitting and gathering dust. _

Sans trots back downstairs a moment later, an old sketchbook held tight to his chest. He flips to the drawing of the yellow dragon, then hands it to Grillby. “Ta-da! Dad thinks his old man drew those, way back when.”

Grillby goes very still and very quiet. He brushes his fingers lightly across the dragon’s image.  _ I-S-K,  _ he signs.  _ I-S-K—Isk. Iskierka.  _

“Iskierka?” Sans repeats, his brow furrowing. “What’s that?”

_ This is Iskierka.  _ Grillby flickers in excitement, scrambling for another book.  _ She was the leader of the dragon rebellion, a long, long time ago. Look— _

He spreads the other book out on the floor. There, near the corner of the page, is a portrait of a yellow dragon’s head. Beneath it, an image of a fire elemental in shimmering blue. Beside it are words in ancient Common—not easy to understand, but manageable, if one sits down and fumbles through it. 

“Neat,” Sans says, studying the dragon’s face—it’s an old face, tired and scarred and determined. “But how come Dad’s old man drew her? Was she popular?”

_ Well, yes, but I doubt there were very many photos or pictures of her, back then. Whoever drew that must have met her at one point. Especially to see her unarmored—perhaps they were even friends! Oh, how neat is that, Wings? To think you have a drawing of the very queen of dragons, right here, sketched by someone she must have been familiar with— _

“Are you fangirling right now, Grillbz?” Sans asks, laughing. 

_ I am fangirling so hard, Sans. _

Gaster laughs, setting the bottle aside once Papyrus has finished it and scooting over to join the huddle around the sketchbook. He studies Iskierka curiously, tracing a finger along the sharp points of her horns. “Alright, alright. I guess that’s pretty cool. You think my dad knew her?”

_ I don’t think it’s out of the question.  _ Grillby reaches out, flipping to the next page—this one has a similar format, but the dragon featured looks quite a bit younger, and their scales gleam purple. They beam, their eyes shining.  _ This is Arkady, her younger brother. You remember I told you about him? Perseverance was his name. _

“Woah, hang on. Who’s he look like?” Sans says, leaning forward to peer at the picture. Gaster studies it right along with him, frowning.

“I mean—kind of like me?” he offers. “But I think that has more to do with the fact we’re both, er, dragon-shaped, than anything else.”

“No, look.” Sans takes the book, hefting it up and holding it up next to Papyrus, who chirps at him. “Paps, you’re so cool, yes you are, yes you aaare—”

Papyrus beams.

“Ooooh, I see it,” Gaster says. “Wow.”

_ That’s...uncanny,  _ Grillby admits.  _ They have the exact same smile. _

_ You don’t think he’s…?  _ Fuku asks, arching her eyebrows and looking at her father.

_ I don’t  _ not  _ think he’s Wings’ dad,  _ Grillby says.  _ But I still don’t understand how a dragon can just interbreed with a skeleton. I mean, magic-wise that’s possible, but biologically, er… _

“Well, how are baby skeletons made?” Sans asks. “You just take two pieces of bone, two pieces of magic, and shove ‘em underground, right? A dragon could do that. They could use their horns, or teeth, or talons, or spikes. They’ve got  _ options.”  _

“But my dad didn’t  _ look  _ like a dragon,” Gaster argues. “I think I’d remember a twenty-ton mythical fire-breathing lizard wandering around the farmhouse. He looked like a normal skeleton. I, uh. I’m pretty sure, anyway. None of my siblings ever turned into dragons, either, and my mother certainly didn’t mention anything about it. I bet those genes would have lain dormant forever if Jackson hadn’t stirred them up.”

“Well,” Sans says, leaning back on his hands. “I guess who your dad is doesn’t really matter, anyway. A bum is a bum, whether he’s a dragon or not. Who cares about that guy? What matters is what you got from him. When are you gonna look at your own DNA?”

“Oh, soon, soon,” Gaster says, closing Arkady’s book and setting it aside. It isn’t important to him—not anymore. “Tomorrow, perhaps.”

“And what happens after that?” Sans asks.

Grillby clears his throat, and Gaster gestures for him to speak.  _ Well, Sans, I’d actually like to be the one to tell you about that. A long time ago, elementals and dragons had pacts. When a dragon came of age, it would grow in its wings—something I imagine you and Papyrus will both experience later—and, if it so desired, it chose an elemental to share its magic with. As you know, your father has lost quite a bit of magic in the past few months, so I thought I might try and share my magic with him. _

“You can do that?” Sans asks.

_ I believe so. Of course, there’s no guarantee, but I’m willing to try, and so is your father. _

“And  _ you’re  _ okay with it?” Sans glances over at Fuku, as does Gaster. 

_I am,_ Fuku says, nodding and smoothing her skirt out. _Your dad makes my dad happy. If he died, then all of us would be really sad. Besides, my dad has lots of magic to spare. It would be selfish for me to take all_ _of it when I don’t even need half._

Sans’ eyes light up. “So—so he’ll be better. He’ll feel better, he won’t be sick and tired anymore!”

Grillby beams.  _ Exactly! If that’s—is that alright with you? _

“Yes!” Sans squeals, practically throwing himself into Grillby’s chest. Grillby topples over backwards, laughing and hugging Sans. “Of course it is—thank you, thank you,  _ thank you thank you—” _

“Sans.” Gaster laughs, reaching over to pluck Sans off of Grillby—instead, Grillby loops an arm around his neck and pulls him down into their pile, too. Gaster yelps and sprawls across them, and Papyrus yaps in concern and skitters away. Rather than try to squirm his way out of the pile, Gaster resigns himself to it, burrowing down into Grillby’s warmth and clicking his teeth affectionately against Sans’ skull. “Ridiculous, the both of you.”

“You’re gonna be okay,” Sans says, giggling and clicking his own teeth against Gaster’s cheek. “You’re gonna feel better again.”

“Yeah.” Gaster hugs them both tightly, and Papyrus pounces into their pile with a squall of disapproval that has them all laughing. “Yeah, I think I am.”

* * *

Setting foot in his basement lab sends a chill up Gaster’s spine, and it makes every part of him twist uncomfortably—although he’s long grown used to it, since his time spent here building a muzzle. He goes about his business as quickly as he can, scraping a thin layer of bone from his ulna and then preparing it for sequencing. He slides a microarray chip with his genetic sample into his fluorescent reader, then makes a hasty retreat back to the safety of his home. 

The results, which he receives a few days later, are as he predicted: a good portion of his DNA does not align with the normal skeleton or blaster DNA they have in the genomic database. Of course, he can’t attempt to align it with any sort of dragon DNA, because dragons were extinct long before DNA sequencing was invented—and, as Grillby said, none of their remains have been found since. Thus, there isn’t an annotated draconic genome in the database for him to work with. But at the very least, he knows what he’s not. He’s not a skeleton, and he’s not a blaster, and he’s not a dragon. He’s some strange in-between, some gangling mutt of a monster, and he finds he doesn’t much mind. He has much bigger things to worry about than  _ bloodlines.  _

He checks his own alignment against Sans’ and Papyrus’ genomes, too. They’re very similar, as to be expected—but there  _ are  _ several differences he notes. However, he has no desire to look into those differences any further. He’s so tired of genetics, of experiments and tests and...science. He had originally passed off Sans’ strange not-quite-a-skeleton, not-quite-a-blaster genome as a result of Gaster’s own genetic reconfiguring, but now—well, now he suspects it’s because of something quite different.  _ Dragons,  _ he thinks, incredulous, as he climbs the stairs to Grillby’s house and sheds his coat.  _ Ridiculous. Simply ridiculous. _

Ridiculous and goddamn fortunate. He and Grillby had stayed up late each night for the past few days, after their children were asleep, and had looked into the strange ritualistic magic that bonded dragons and elementals. Gaster can only hope it will work with a half-breed like himself—it’s a distant hope, perhaps, but it’s all he’s got at the moment. They’d decided to make their foolhardy attempt at ritual magic this evening, since there’s little point in waiting. Time is a demanding mistress, and Gaster has ever been bound to her whims. 

_ Wings,  _ Grillby greets him as he enters the house, dusting flour off of his apron.  _ Any luck with the DNA tests? _

“Yes, actually—I’m not completely a skeleton or a blaster,” he offers. “I can’t tell you I’m a  _ dragon,  _ or even get close to guessing at a subspecies, but there’s something different there. Anatomically, a dragon is our most reasonable guess.”

_ Well, that’s good enough for me. It’s worth a try. _

“It is.” Gaster sheds his coat, hanging it up next to the door. “Listen, and even if this doesn’t work, I really appreciate your willingness to attempt it. I’m very grateful, and I know the boys are, too.”

_ You’re more than welcome.  _ Grillby flickers warmly at him, patting the countertop next to him.  _ Want to help me finish this loaf?  _

Gaster steps up beside him, eyeing the strange, sticky mass of dough in front of them uncertainly. “I’ve never done this before.”

_ It should be exciting, then. Here— _ Grillby presses the heels of his hands to the dough, pushing it forward before folding it in half and repeating the process. Then he rotates it, dusts it with a handful of flour, and does it again.  _ Easy, see? You try. _

Gaster tries. Grillby discovers, to his evident delight, that he can sprinkle flour directly through Gaster’s hands and onto the dough when it gets too sticky. Unfortunately, Gaster’s attempts at kneading are too timid for him. He chuckles, reaching around Gaster and setting a hand on top of his. “Here,” he mumbles, guiding Gaster’s hand through the right motion. “Not like you’re scared. You’re not going to hurt it.”

Gaster’s soul flips in his chest, dizzy and warm. He breathes a sigh of relief when Grillby steps away again, although the space at his back suddenly feels far too cold and empty. He tries to knead a little bit better, after that. Once Grillby declares the dough done, they plop it into a pan to proof.

_ We’ll be eating fresh bread tonight,  _ Grillby signs cheerfully as Gaster washes his hands.  _ You should take some home for the boys. _

“I’ll do that,” he says, reaching out and dusting flour off of Grillby’s shoulder. (How on  _ earth  _ did he get flour all the way up there?) “I’m sure they’ll enjoy it. Speaking of tonight, though—what’s the plan?”

_ Would you like to meet me at the edge of the woods?  _

“Oooh, it sounds so furtive when you say it like that,” Gaster says, laughing. They’d chosen to leave town, just in case the ritual magic did something truly unfortunate and forced Gaster back into that  _ goddamned  _ draconic form he does so loathe. He hopes their caution is pointless. “But sure. I’ll meet you there once the boys are asleep. Is Fuku spending the night? No sense in hiring two babysitters when we could lump our children together, right?”

_ Oh, I suppose. Who’s babysitting? _

“Only the king of all monsters.”

Grillby snorts.

“What?” Gaster asks, grinning. “Nothing but the best for our babies.”

_ I’ll see you tonight, Wings. _

“Is this your way of kicking me out?”

Grillby flicks a towel playfully at him.  _ Get. I expect you for dinner. _

Gaster mocks a bow on his way to the door. “Your wish is my command, O Great Elemental of Mine.”

Grillby harrumphs, but Gaster doesn’t miss the way he flickers pink at the edges. It’s...good, he thinks, getting to be playful with Grillby. It’s much better than remembering that the elemental is still angry at him, and rightfully so. 

As promised, they meet later that night, once their children are safe and sound asleep under Asgore’s watchful eye. (The poor king—Gaster doesn’t think he sleeps when he babysits, anymore. It frightens him too much, after Sans’ disappearance.) The wind curls crisply around the two of them, and Gaster doesn’t bother hiding the way he huddles closer to Grillby for warmth. They head farther into the forest, until Grillby stops in a tidy little clearing.  _ Okay,  _ he says. A brisk breath of smoke leaves his mouth.  _ Are you ready? _

“As ready as I’ll ever be, I suppose,” he says, rather more grimly than he intended.

_ If you don’t want to— _

“No, no, I do. I’m just—nervous,” he admits, taking a deep breath. He hunches his shoulders. “What if it doesn’t work?”

_ We will deal with that reality if it occurs. We will find another way. _

“...and if there  _ is  _ no other way?”

_ Then we make one. _

“Your overconfidence is showing.”

_ Well, I have to compensate for someone’s lack,  _ Grillby says dryly. 

“Alright, alright, I get it.” Gaster straightens up, clasping his hands behind his back. There’s no point in dwelling on  _ what ifs.  _ What will be, will be, and Gaster will survive it, as he always does. He has to believe that. He  _ has to.  _ “Let’s begin.”

Grillby moves to stand in front of him, then holds a hand out, his palm facing Gaster’s chest and the dim glow of his butchered soul beneath his jacket.  _ May I? _

Gaster takes a deep breath, then inclines his head. Grillby summons his soul out of the embrace of his ribs, and it hovers between them—ugly, tainted. Guilt curdles through Gaster’s bones, and he glances away. There’s an intimacy in it, in having his soul on open display between them. It’s terrifying. Grillby already knows how rotten he is, of course, how deeply flawed, but to see it so  _ clearly— _

It makes Gaster himself sick with loathing. How much more disgusted must Grillby be?

Something unbearably warm brushes against the surface of his soul, sends a jolt from his head to his toes, and he glances back at Grillby.  _ It’s alright,  _ Grillby says, the tips of his fingers pressed to the front of Gaster’s soul.  _ You don’t have to be ashamed. _

“It’s terrible.”

_ It is no such thing,  _ Grillby signs sharply—but his touch against Gaster’s soul remains soft and warm.  _ Certainly, it could use a little bit of work, but who’s soul couldn’t? It isn’t perfect— _ you  _ aren’t perfect. That doesn’t mean you should hate yourself. _

Gaster hunches his shoulders.

_ Oh, Wings. We’ve got some work to do.  _ Grillby cradles Gaster’s soul gently between his palms.  _ But let’s start by keeping you alive. Your turn. _

Gaster hesitates, but he digs his teeth into what little courage he has and reaches out to summon Grillby’s soul. He’s never seen it before, but it’s every bit as beautiful as he imagined it would be. It gleams beautifully, wreathed with dense, powerful magic. Of course there are blemishes, but not a single one of them could make Grillby seem lesser in Gaster’s eyes. 

“It’s wonderful,” he says, reaching out to cradle the soul tentatively in his hands. The same vicious, violent protectiveness he’s used to feeling around the boys rears its head in his chest, curls claws through his bones. He’d slaughter the first person to look at this soul the wrong way. “It’s perfect, Grillby. You’re perfect.”

_ Far from it,  _ Grillby says,  _ but it isn’t a bad soul by any means. In fact, I’m rather proud of how far it’s come. I hope you can feel that for yourself one day. _

Gaster hums quietly, rubbing his thumb over one particularly dark patch on Grillby’s soul. It feels rough, and far colder than it should be.

_ That one is from you,  _ Grillby says, and cold guilt washes farther down Gaster’s spine. 

“I’m sorry. I know it doesn’t mean much but I’m still sorry, I—”

Grillby reaches out, setting a hand over Gaster’s.  _ It’s alright. We’ll fix it together. First things first, though—I do believe it’s your soul in need of more immediate attention. Are you ready? I’ll go first. _

Gaster nods nervously, clicking his teeth together and releasing Grillby’s soul. The two souls hover between them, inches in front of their chests and glowing softly in the darkness. Grillby brings his hands back to his own soul, touching two fingers to the middle of it before beginning to speak. He recites the same lines they’d read over and over for the past few days, the words they’d practiced under their breaths in each spare moment; it’s spoken in the Elemental language, but Grillby had explained its meaning to him. It’s a spell, more or less—an old spell to pool their soulmagic together. Some of the spells had been more advanced than that, but they had settled for the simplest version of the verses. It’s enough. It isn’t as though they’re getting  _ married,  _ for heavens’ sake. 

(For some reason, the thought flushes Gaster’s cheeks.)

As Grillby finishes his portion of the spell, he moves his fingers from the front of his soul to the front of Gaster’s. A line of thin white magic follows his touch, forming a bridge between their souls. It hesitates at the edge of Gaster’s soul, however, and it does not break through to his own soulmagic—not yet. So Gaster takes a deep breath, and then he repeats his own lines carefully after Grillby. His lines are spoken in his own terrible Common, his font smearing the words, but Gaster hopes and hopes and  _ hopes  _ they’ll work. There’s simply no way he’s going to be able to learn the draconic language his verses are  _ meant  _ to be spoken in in such a short amount of time, let alone  _ pronounce  _ it properly. Once he’s finished speaking, the both of them look nervously at each other, breath curling around their faces. For a moment, Gaster fears nothing will happen—and then something does.

Grillby’s magic feels like fire. Predictable enough, Gaster supposes, but holy  _ fucking hell  _ he was not ready for it. It burns its way through him, and he gasps and shudders, his eyes flying wide. It tastes like soft warmth, like sitting around a campfire and making s’mores and turning shadows into shapes. It tastes like ash, like crumbling buildings and frying flesh and  _ hell— _ and it  _ hurts.  _ Knowing Grillby, taking Grillby’s magic into his own, it  _ hurts.  _ Ignorance is bliss, and it has been suddenly and brutally torn away from him. There is no part of Grillby hidden from him, in this moment, though he fears too fiercely to pry any closer to his elemental’s soul. Grillby’s secrets are his own, and Gaster will take them only when Grillby offers them. Fortunately, after the initial searing  _ burn  _ of Grillby’s magic through his bones, things begin to settle.

He’s warm. He’s so blissfully, preciously  _ warm.  _ And—and! He feels alert, and awake, and  _ sharp.  _ His bones aren’t as solid, perhaps, as they should be, but they’re damn well heavier and sturdier than they were mere minutes ago. Several of the cracks across his body fill themselves in with fresh bone, blissful little aches and stings that mean growing stronger and growing  _ better.  _ For the first time in such a terribly long time, he feels whole and healthy and powerful again.

_ Damn,  _ why didn’t they do this sooner?

Gaster...isn’t sure what Grillby feels. Of course, he can  _ feel  _ everything Grillby feels, but he’s having trouble separating Grillby’s emotions from his own. Which one of them is so elated? Which one is so frightened, so amazed, so incredulous? Does it even make a difference? Entwined as they are at the moment, they may as well be the same person. It’s that thought that eventually makes Gaster draw his own soul back to himself, prying the threads of his emotions away from Grillby piece by sticky piece. It’s painful, but it’s necessary, and Grillby does not cling. They are individuals, first and foremost, and Gaster has no desire to take that independence from Grillby (and he does so fear having it taken from himself).

Once he can think clearly—once he knows he’s thinking his own thoughts and not a strange blend of his thoughts and Grillby’s together—he leans forward, peering at Grillby in concern. “Grillby? Are you well?”

Grillby lunges forward to hug him, and Gaster laughs giddily. Grillby’s fingers trace something across his back, again and again, and Gaster struggles to focus on what, exactly, it is. His soul warms once he realizes:  _ I love you.  _

Gaster presses his cheek to Grillby’s, making stupid happy noises that he hopes convey the exact same thing.

_ Look,  _ Grillby says, his eyes shining when he pulls back. _ Look at you! How do you feel?  _

“I feel so much better. See!” He lifts his jacket and his shirt, showing off his newly-mended bone and the bright flush of his soul. It isn’t perfect (never will be, he supposes, and he’s slowly coming to terms with that), but it’s already damned better. The dark patches remain, but the bright patches are brighter, now, denser and stronger. 

_ Beautiful,  _ Grillby says, his eyes crinkling at the edges as he smiles. He reaches forward, cupping Gaster’s face in his hands and smoothing his thumbs over the cracks around his eyes.  _ I couldn’t get rid of these. Perhaps if you tried to take more magic— _

“No.” He rubs a hand across the fractures there, still tingling from the warmth of Grillby’s touch. “I’ll keep these, but thank you kindly.”

_...as you wish. _

“What about  _ you?  _ How do you feel?”

_Much the same,_ _no stronger or weaker. When our souls were together, though, I—can we do that again sometime?_ Grillby looks elated, although there’s still a pink hue to his flames as he says it. _That was incredible! I felt like—like I knew you, like I actually_ understood _you, and you weren’t hiding anything from me!_

Gaster rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. “Well, if that’s what it takes to get you to trust me, I won’t say no.”

_ Did you...not like it? _

“No, no, it was good. It was...weird, but good, I think. I’m only nervous because I’m, well, me. I’d really like to do it again, as long as we’re careful not to get too mixed up. I’m curious—I want to know you more too, Grillby,” he says, offering Grillby a grin. 

Grillby sparks in delight.  _ Good! I’m glad. I’ll also I admit, I do feel very relieved knowing this has worked. It’s like a weight is gone. _

“You can say that again.” It feels as though an entire universe has been lifted from his shoulders, and he shudders with the relief of it. He’s going to survive. He’s going to  _ live.  _ He can’t quite wipe the grin from his face as he and Grillby make the walk home together, giddy and laughing and  _ whole.  _

* * *

“Whooo’s ready for physical therapy day?” Gaster coos, scooping Papyrus up and kissing the tip of his nose. Papyrus hums thoughtfully and nudges his face. “Papyrus is! Yes he is, yes he iiiis, he’s going to be so braaave, such a big brave boy—”

Sans peeks over the top of Gaster’s phone (which he had been quite involved playing Minecraft on) to look fondly at the both of them. “When’s the therapist gonna be here?”

“She—” The doorbell rings. “ —is here now!”

Gaster quickly sets Papyrus down next to Sans, racing to open the door for Piper. She greets him warmly, stepping into the house and shedding her coat. Papyrus eyes her warily, but he doesn’t immediately move to hide beneath the couch. Gaster decides to scoop him back up before he gets that idea, and Papyrus curls tightly against his chest and clacks his teeth nervously as Piper approaches them.

“Well, it’s been a while since I’ve seen you, little mister,” Piper says, peering closely at Papyrus. “We’re going to be working together for quite some time to get you feeling nice and healthy and mobile again! Your daddy and brother are going to be here the whole time, so you have nothing to worry about. How has he been doing, socialization-wise, Dr. Gaster?”

“A lot better,” Gaster says, smoothing a hand gently over Papyrus’ skull. “Not perfect, yet, but he’s getting there.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Can you set him down for me? I want to get a look at the top of his spine and see how all the vertebrae align.”

Gaster gently sets Papyrus down and keeps one hand cupped around his chest to prevent him from bolting. Sans comes to sit next to them, settling in beside Papyrus so he can watch the slow deforestation of Minecraft’s blocky world. Piper crouches next to Papyrus, looking closely at his spine. She runs her paws along it, her eyes narrowed in thought, and Papyrus squirms unhappily. She pulls back. 

“Well, the alignment looks stellar,” she declares. “No odd torquing or curvature. I imagine he’s so stiff because the healing process probably laid down thicker bone than it needed to, and in the wrong places. Who healed him?”

“The first time?” Gaster’s mouth twists. “Not someone experienced enough to be doing it. The second time was by a medical professional.”

“Poor dear—a broken spine is bad enough the first time.” Piper clucks her tongue unhappily, smoothing her ears back. “The good news is that this is definitely a fixable problem, especially since he’s so young. If we can get him moving like normal, the bone should smooth out and the trabeculae will realign against the appropriate lines of stress. It’s all just work.”

“Well, we can handle work. Can we start today?”

“That’s the spirit.” Piper grins, gently hooking her hands beneath Papyrus’ hips to pull him back towards her. Papyrus glances uncertainly over his shoulder, but he doesn’t fight her (he must be, Gaster thinks grimly, quite used to people moving him around against his will). “I’ll show you some exercises you can do with him every couple of days, but what I’d really like to do is get him up to the center. I think aquatic therapy would really help him—and if that doesn’t seem to be cutting it, we could always use a spinal brace for a few months.”

Gaster watches, quiet and attentive, as Piper shows him a few of the stretches for Papyrus’ physical therapy—he had already had a routine suggested by Dr. Yeoman, of course, but this routine is significantly more specialized. Papyrus stands and sighs and endures the whole process with phenomenal patience, letting them manipulate his limbs as they will. A few times he whines, if they push him too far, and Piper immediately lets up.

“You want it to stretch, and it may be uncomfortable, but you don’t want to  _ hurt  _ him,” she says, gently flexing Papyrus’ hind leg. Then she pushes his hind paw forward until his talons touch the back of his skull, as they would if he were scratching an itch there. Papyrus sighs a long-suffering sigh and offers Sans a  _ most  _ affronted look when he laughs. “We want to help him work on his balance, too. We have a lot of great equipment at the center for that, but you can help at home, too. Let him go up and down the stairs if you can, and try not to carry him too much. You can lift one of his legs, just like this, and let him balance on three instead of four for a couple of minutes. Or you can cross one leg over the other and see if you can get him to stand that way for a minute—”

She delves into another round of lessons, demonstrating each exercise carefully for him. By the time she’s finished, it’s almost dinnertime, and Papyrus is more than happy to flop down on the couch and wallow. “Poor guy,” Sans teases, scratching beneath his skull. “Your life is just so much work.”

Gaster sees Piper out, then spends a few minutes reviewing the packet of exercises she’d given him. He’ll certainly need to take Papyrus to the PT center next week—he’s only worried about how many people might be there. But, he supposes, there’s no point in keeping Papyrus so sheltered; he’ll need to start getting used to strangers, and a clinic should be relatively calm and quiet. It will be good exercise for him, both physically _and_ psychologically.

“Aaaalright,” he says, setting the packet gently on the table. “What’s for dinner, kids?”

“Pancakes!”

“Pancakes? For dinner?” 

“Yeah,” Sans says, rolling off of the couch and trotting into the kitchen. He climbs up onto the step-stool, and Papyrus, unwilling to be left on his own, follows close behind. He leaps up next to Sans, bracing his front paws on the counter. “You know what we need?”

“What’s that?”

“Some sweet jams.” Sans sets Gaster’s phone down on the counter, and Whitney Houston immediately begins to serenade them. Gaster chuckles and reaches for the ingredients. His children help him cook—er, kind of. Mostly they just sneak chocolate chips and dance around the kitchen while he flips the pancakes.

And Gaster...doesn’t think about Jackson at all, for almost an entire hour. What peace.

Of course, he thinks about Jackson a  _ fucking lot  _ the next day, because he has a therapy appointment. He tries his best—if he wants to get rid of these terrible thoughts, these terrible habits, then Dr. Willow is his best bet. He wants to be good. For his children, for Grillby, for his friends, he wants to be  _ good _ . So he tells Dr. Willow everything; he tells them about the violence of his thoughts, about the anger that churns in his soul, about the hate he nurtures in his bones. They listen, and take their notes, and then offer him healthier alternatives to murder. (There are, as it turns out, several healthier alternatives to murder.) They talk about intrusive thoughts, about trauma and emotional dysregulation and anger management. Then they talk about lighter things! They talk about the boys’ improvements, about Grillby and Asgore and Alphys, about chocolate chip pancakes and dragons and the upcoming holidays. Finally, they talk about Gaster’s imminent return to work.

“How are you feeling about that?” Dr. Willow prompts gently, sipping their mug of coffee.

Gaster leans back in the armchair, rubbing the back of his neck and exhaling softly. “I...don’t know. I’m happy to get back to work, I think? I mean, I want to have something to do, something to focus on that’s not, you know, terrible. I want to quit moping around and feeling sorry for myself. But going back to the lab, it’s—going to be difficult.”

“And why is that?”

“Just—the smell? The way it looks, the way it sounds, it’s going to remind me of Jackson. Especially the biology lab, blegh. Of course, I can avoid that, I think. If I just keep to the physics and chem labs, I should be alright. Most of my work is done in my office or meeting rooms, anyhow. But I just—I—” He spreads his hands helplessly. “Science.”

“Do you like science?”

“I’ve always loved it.”

“Do you still love it?”

Gaster glances away. “It’s...a brilliant thing. Like—like—oh, I’m no good at metaphors. But it’s like—you like outer space, okay? It’s really cool. You’ve spent your whole life studying it, it fascinates you, it’s _amazing._ Then you get shoved into space, and your blood boils, and you freeze to death, and you float alone in the middle of nowhere for ages, and suddenly it doesn’t seem that great. I mean, nothing about it has changed! It’s still _space,_ it didn’t do anything wrong, it still has all those characteristics you adored, but it’s...you who’s changed, because you overstepped your bounds, or because someone else forced you over them and now you’re scared and your fear gets all mixed up with your fascination and you can’t get them apart anymore.”

“Those are some complex feelings,” Dr. Willow says, clearly doing their best to Validate him. He appreciates the thought. “It’s going to take some time to sort them out. I think it would be a good idea for you to go back to the lab and feel things out, if you don’t think it would distress you too much.”

“Yes. I definitely need to.” He folds his arms across his chest. “Of course, there’s the matter of the boys, too. I don’t know what I’m going to do with them, if I go back to work. They’re not fond of being left alone for more than a few hours, and I can’t say I’m fond of leaving them, either, but bringing them to work with me is obviously out of the question. I’ve considered a daycare, but—ah, they wouldn’t like it. I’d be too worried about Papyrus’ reactions, anyway. Daycares are so noisy and messy and unpredictable.”

“You know Papyrus is going to have to get used to these things, sooner or later. You can’t keep him hidden at home because you’re frightened of him.”

“I know, I know. I just think that’s a bit much for him, right now. We’re taking things slow. Look, I’m taking him to a physical therapy clinic next week,” he offers, and Dr. Willow’s eyes brighten. “But that’s going to be calm and quiet, and a daycare is...not. I mean, the last time I put the two of them in a daycare, they broke into a royal evidence locker, committed a felony, insulted the sole Judge of the Underground and re-traumatized themselves. They’re not exactly well-behaved—which is fine! I couldn’t expect perfect behavior from them, even if they  _ hadn’t  _ been through all of this bullshit. They’re kids. They’re going to mess up, but I’m trying to set them up for success as much as I can, you know? And that means keeping them out of stressful situations until they’re ready to handle them.”

“That’s good thinking, I’ll agree,” Dr. Willow says, tapping their pen against their clipboard. “Well, have you considered a different job?”

Gaster chokes. “A  _ what?” _

“A different job.” Dr. Willow chuckles softly. “I take it you haven’t.”

“I mean I’ve—I’ve toyed with the idea, but not seriously, stars, no. I’ve been the Royal Scientist for over a century—I can’t imagine doing anything different. Besides, I couldn’t trust anyone else in that position. What if they ended up like Jackson?”

“People like Jackson are very, very rare,” Dr. Willow assures him. “You know that. I’m sure there are quite a few people who would excel in your position, and I’m sure you’re aware of that, too.”

Someone who could replace him...does come to mind. He shrugs, wrapping his arms around himself. “Maybe. But I...don’t know what else I could do, if I quit there. I’m not good at anything else. I’m eccentric, I talk too much about my interests, I’m freakishly specialized in my research topics, and I’m far too used to leading discussions. I—”

Dr. Willow rummages through their desk drawer, pulling out a business card and holding it out to him. “I know just the person you need to talk to.”

He takes the card, his eyes flicking over it and then widening. “Oh.”

“They’ve been looking for a while. I think they’d really enjoy sitting down and getting to know you, Dr. Gaster. You should give it a shot. Just talk to them. Give it some thought, if you decide you really don’t want to return to the lab full-time.”

Gaster hesitates. Then: “Yes, alright. Thank you.”

Dr. Willow smiles warmly at him, all three eyes shining. “You’re more than welcome, doctor.”

* * *

The next day, Gaster sets foot in the capital’s lab for the first time in months. He trembles as he does, pulling his lab coat tightly around him. His coworkers greet him, ecstatic at his return, and he tries his best to keep up a conversation with them all—but it’s all already overwhelming. The air smells like chemicals. The lights gleam off of hard, sanitary tile. Everywhere he looks, there are white lab coats and white lab coats and white lab coats.

He barricades himself in his office as soon as he can, lights a campfire-scented candle, and feels a little bit better when he gazes up at the pictures of his son. He’ll need to add some of Papyrus, soon. For a few minutes, he sips his cup of tea and stares at his computer monitor. He reaches for the mouse, then stops. He reaches again. Stops again. Reaches, and this time he manages to drag up his email.  _ Fuck,  _ he’s missed so much. The very idea of catching up again seems impossible, so he deletes everything. Cool. Problem solved. If it’s important, they’ll send it again. 

He spends a few minutes dredging through old lab reports, after that. Where had he left off, again? And why had it mattered…? What is he actually supposed to be doing right now? Creating things? Inventing things?  _ What  _ things, and how? Where does he start? Stars, he used to be good at this. Now he looks at his lab reports, and he feels nothing but empty dread. There are no ideas. There are no sparks flying. There’s no love.

His rage at Jackson curls through him again, and he cups his hands around his mug and lets the heat wash through his fingers. When that doesn’t work, he chews a pencil until it snaps, then flaps his hands furiously. It helps, some. His anger resolves into a dimmer sort of bitterness. Jackson has taken far, far too much from him.

...nothing to be done for it, now.

He takes a deep breath and scrubs his hands across his face and accomplishes nothing, for most of the day. He feels fucking awful about it. Asgore has been ridiculously kind and understanding, giving him months to recover without even bothering to dock his pay, and  _ this  _ is the kind of work Gaster can do for him, now? It isn’t fair. It simply isn’t fair. The king needs someone passionate and forward-thinking in this position, not old, run-down, miserable Dr. Gaster.

But no. That’s not it. He takes a deep breath and refocuses himself, because it’s going to do him no good, thinking things like that. He may not be able to work as well as he did previously, yes, that’s true, but it doesn’t mean he’s  _ run-down  _ and  _ miserable.  _ It just means he’s changed, and that’s okay. He just...has to change some other things, too. He can make this work. It’s all going to be okay.

Gaster shuts his computer down, then heads for the file room. He rummages through the employee files for a moment, selecting quite a few before returning to his office and getting to work. This, at least, he can focus himself on—this feels important and valuable, and so does he, while he’s working on it. It’s a feeling he’s missed painfully. 

That evening, he goes home, and he scrubs and scrubs and scrubs in the shower to get the wretched lab-scent off of him. Then he makes his boys dinner and plays card games with Sans and cuddles Papyrus while they watch cartoons and he realizes that being the Royal Scientist hasn’t been his priority in almost seven years, now. And he’s...okay with that. More than okay, actually. He’d much rather be a father than a scientist. Still, removing such a large chunk of his identity isn’t an easy thing to do, and he’s not yet sure if he’s okay with it. But there’s no harm in putting feelers out, right?

The next morning, while the boys are still asleep, he stands out on the porch with a mug of tea and a business card. He takes a deep breath, then dials the number the card presents to him. The phone rings for a moment, then clicks. “Monsters’ University, this is Dean of College Dr. Boulger speaking.”

“Hi, Dr. Boulger,” Gaster says, gazing out across the snow-sprinkled yard as the lights overhead begin to brighten, soft and gradual. “This is Dr. W.D. Gaster, Royal Scientist.”

“Oh, well, hello, Dr. Gaster. To what do we owe the honor?”

“I, ah—actually, I was calling to see if I could sit down and have a conversation with you, sometime soon. I heard a rumor that you were looking to fill a position for a professor of physics and engineering…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: i Could Not for the life of me find anywhere that made sense to shove arkady’s story (and the story of why in the Hell gaster has dragon genes) into the actual fic, so i will explain it!! here!! warnings for uuuh body horror, gore, violence, war stuff, suicide, unethical experimentation.
> 
> so basically arkady was one of the dragons taken and experimented on by humans way back before the war. there was a lot of weird, dark magic being used on them to keep them from dusting so their scales/talons/fangs/etc could be harvested after they died, and that magic succeeded on arkady, kind of! arkady was killed escaping from the humans, but he wasn’t able to dust or, technically, to die. his flesh rotted off, but his skeleton and soul were left, which he was reasonably distraught about. the magic the humans had used on him had also tainted his own magic, giving him the ability to shapeshift and appear human (much like gaster). his older sister, iskierka, along with pretty much all of his friends, were also killed fighting against the humans. after several years of being a miserable, lonely undying skeleton dragon, arkady decided he did Not want to live in this world any longer. so he did something terribly cruel:
> 
> he kept to his hominid skeleton form and wooed gaster’s mother, consolas, for the soul purpose of having as Many children as he could. his idea was that the kids would leech off whatever remained of his soul magic so he could finally die. along the way, unfortunately, he got a little bit attached to his growing family. he wasn’t a good father by any means (actually he was pretty awful) but he did start to feel terrible about killing consolas child by child. he abandoned them after they’d had nine children and went to live on his own again, because he didn’t want to watch her die. after that shitty move, he lived for several more years as the human/monster war began, but stayed out of it. he died a few decades after that, as gaster grew and took what was left of his magic.


	32. his sun and sky

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: references to child neglect/abuse/violence, mentions of vomiting, symptoms of ptsd, self-loathing
> 
> “Now I know I had a family and I was a person just like evryone.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes
> 
> aaaaAAAAAAND ROLL OUT THE AWESOME ART !!!!! [here](https://purropurro.tumblr.com/post/616282980202299392/shitpost-for-parsnipit-s-fic-algernon-i-couldnt) we've got a frickin fun meme about papyrus learning to talk by @purropurro, and [here](https://ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber.tumblr.com/post/616295841088634880/a-gay-and-his-dragon) is an adorable grillster comic re: gaster's new fire-breathing abilities by @ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber. thank you both very very much !!!!!!!

“Alright, Papyrus. Here we go,” Dad says, and Papyrus watches him intently. He scoops a bright orange bottle off of the kitchen counter, uncapping it and rolling a pair of pills into his hand. For a brief moment, he hesitates—and then he pops the pills into his mouth, and they dissolve in a flush of magic. He reaches for a second bottle, shaking out a single pill and pressing it into a block of cheese. “Your turn, kiddo.”

He tosses the cheese into the air, and Papyrus snaps it up, his tail wagging. 

“You think that’ll work?” Sans asks from behind him, leaning against the kitchen table.

“I think it’ll help until his anxiety is less acute,” Dad says, capping both bottles and sliding them into the cabinet above the counter. “Here, go get dressed. I’ll be done with breakfast soon, and then we’ve got to go.”

“Okie dokie,” Sans says, heading back up the stairs. “C’mon, Papyrus.”

Papyrus bounds after his big brother, although he slows some as he nears the stairs. Climbing them is still a slippery task, and his lower back protests the movement—but Sans walks ahead of him, and being left behind hurts more than any physical injury could. When they reach the bedroom, Sans sheds his pajamas and yanks on jeans and a t-shirt with Mr. Spock from Star Trek on the front. Papyrus wags his tail—Mr. Spock from Star Trek is good and calm and quiet, and Papyrus likes him very much.

Next, Sans helps Papyrus out of his own pajamas. “Which one today?” he asks, holding up two long-sleeved shirts. One is bright orange with the puppies from Puppy Dog Pals on it; the other is green and has the Rugrats on it. Papyrus nudges the green one, then holds still as Sans helps him get it on. A pair of sweatpants follow, and Papyrus gives himself a good shake to settle everything into place once Sans stands back. 

“Awesome,” Sans says, clapping his hands together. “You ready for today?”

Papyrus beams at him.

“I’ll take that as an enthusiastic yes,” Sans says cheerfully, leading the way back downstairs. Papyrus goes even more slowly  _ down  _ the stairs, because falling down is quite a bit easier than falling up. When they reach the kitchen, Dad has set the table with a variety of delicious-smelling foods. Dad scoops Papyrus up, setting him down on a chair. He slides a bowl of warm oatmeal in front of Papyrus. As soon as he backs away again, Papyrus digs in. They don’t make him wait to eat, like Master did, and he’s (almost) completely confident now that they won’t punish him for eating without a Command. In fact, no one has punished him for...anything, really, since he left Master. 

(Sometimes, he still wonders where his master is, and when he’ll return. Papyrus...misses him, although the thought of leaving Sans and Dad fills him with such terrible dread that he dares not dwell on it long.)

As soon as Papyrus finishes his bowl of oatmeal, Dad slides him a plate with toast and unsweetened grape jelly. Papyrus wolfs that down, too, scraping excess jelly from his nose and chewing it enthusiastically off of his paws. Sans eats more slowly, although no less enthusiastically. Dad, in contrast, merely nibbles at a slice of toast once he sits down. His eyes are far-away and thoughtful. They’re usually far-away and thoughtful, Papyrus has noticed. Dad isn’t always completely  _ here,  _ and Papyrus can’t blame him—sometimes  _ here  _ isn’t a very happy place to be. 

Then Dad takes a deep breath, and he refocuses himself, and his eyes grow sharp again. He reaches for his own bowl of oatmeal. “So,” he says, “do you boys have any big plans for the afternoon?”

“Mm, not really,” Sans says, swinging his legs. “Cartoons, toys, books, the usual. You?”

“Oh, lab reports, meeting minutes, emails, the usual, but I thought we might have a game night tonight. Would you like that?”

“Yeah, that sounds fun. You think Papyrus could play?”

“Er, well—he’s a bit young, but I’m sure he could help you win.”

Sans reaches over, ruffling a hand over Papyrus’ skull. “Heck yeah he can. He’s an awesome teammate.”

Papyrus nuzzles Sans’ hand affectionately, then springs down from his chair and heads for the couch. He wedges himself under it; it’s a perfectly comfortable and safe place to rest while Dad and Sans finish their breakfast. He hears the clatter of their dishes a few minutes later, and then Dad kneels in front of him. “Alright, Papyrus,” he says. “Time to go.”

Papyrus squeezes back out, and Dad scoops him up and nuzzles his face. Papyrus chuffs in affection, nibbling Dad’s chin before relaxing against his chest. He un-relaxes just as quickly when he realizes they’re heading for the front door, and an anxious whine rises in his throat. 

“It’s alright, little one. We’re only going out for a few hours. It’s perfectly safe, I promise.” Dad squeezes Papyrus gently, and the pressure against his bones soothes him some. “I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

Papyrus squirms unhappily as Dad helps him into his coat and boots, and he thrusts his face into the collar of Dad’s parka as soon as he can. Dad wraps the coat around Papyrus, buttoning it up around him so he’s ensconced in darkness and warmth and Dad-smell. He stays that way for quite some time, listening warily to the noises outside Dad’s coat. He hears footsteps, the crunch and squeak of snow, Sans’ quiet chatter. Then he hears the lap of waves, and the air around them grows warmer, thick with humidity. When he peeks out of Dad’s coat, the world is dim and blue. 

“Here we are,” Dad announces, stopping in front of a little, stout white building. “This is where Piper works, Papyrus. We’ll be visiting here quite a bit to help you feel better. Today you’re going swimming—I bet it’s going to be more fun than you think.”

They enter the building, and Papyrus shoves his face into Dad’s coat again so he doesn’t have to see the world. 

“Good morning, Dr. Gaster, Mr. Sans,” he hears a familiar voice say—Piper, he thinks, that strange little hare that likes to move him in funny ways. “How are we this morning?”

“We’re good,” Sans says. “How about you?”

“I’m doing phenomenally, thank you. And what about little Papyrus?”

“He’s nervous,” Dad says, and a hand smooths across Papyrus’ back. “We’ll see how far we can get, but I don’t want to stress him out too much.”

“That’s perfectly fine. If he gets too distressed, we’ll stop right away. Come this way, please.” He hears Piper’s odd, lolloping gait more away from them, and then Dad follows. Their footsteps echo strangely, and then they enter a room drenched in the scent of chlorine and water. Papyrus’ curiosity gets the best of him, and he peeks out again. A large pool of water sits in front of them. A few strange monsters dot the edges, but Piper leads them to a quiet, isolated corner.

“Papyrus,” Dad murmurs, teeth clicking gently against his skull. “Time to be brave, alright? You can do this.”

Then he unbuttons his coat, and he pries Papyrus away from his chest, and he sets him down. Papyrus stands stiffly, his eyes darting around the room and his tail low. Sans takes a seat on the edge of the pool, rolling his pants legs up and dangling his feet into the water. Papyrus slinks towards him, settling down at his side. “Wanna go swimming?” Sans asks him. “It’s lots of fun.”

“You can join him, if you’d like to,” Piper offers, hopping down the stairs and into the water. “We have clean swim trunks in the office.”

“Can I, Dad?”

“If you’d like to, by all means.”

“You should come in too.” Sans says, grabbing Dad’s hands and pulling him away from the pool. Papyrus joins in, grabbing the cuff of his pants and tugging gently. If Dad needs to be herded away from the Big Dangerous Water, Papyrus is more than willing to assist. Maybe that way they can get home faster. “Look, Paps wants you to.”

Dad groans, then proceeds to lead the way back to a small room. The three of them change into what Papyrus assumes are swimming trunks, then head back  _ towards  _ the water. Papyrus pads after them, baffled. Had they not just walked  _ away  _ from the water? Why are they going  _ back?  _ Why are they—oh my god Dad is getting into the water. Papyrus whines, pacing anxiously along the side of the pool. 

“Here, bud,” Dad says, reaching up for him. “It’s okay. Sans, can you hand him to me?”

Sans scoops Papyrus up, gently lowering him to Dad. Papyrus curls himself around Dad’s shoulders, glowering at the water that laps at them. Sans lowers himself in after them, leaning back against the wall. “C’mon, Paps,” he says, splashing the water with a hand, “it’s just like bathtime.”

It is  _ nothing  _ like bathtime, thank you very much. Bathtime is small and quiet, and this is...not. 

“Can you get him in the water for me?” Piper asks. “Does he know how to swim?”

“Well,” Dad says, “I suppose we’re about to find out.” He gently pulls Papyrus into his arms again, lowering him into the water but keeping him tucked snugly against his chest. Papyrus cringes, automatically paddling his front feet and making an attempt to claw his way back up his father. “Easy, Paps, it’s okay. Just water. I’m not gonna let go, don’t worry.”

The water is warm, and it  _ feels  _ like bathtime water (sans the bubbles), but there’s so much  _ space  _ around him. It’s distressing, to say the least. He digs his claws into Dad’s ribs to prevent himself from being pried off and dropped into the great unknown, although Dad makes no attempt to do that. He just...holds Papyrus, there in the water, and nothing bad happens. Sans and Piper both seem as relaxed as Dad is, and after several minutes, Papyrus grudgingly follows suit, his shoulders slumping and his claws unhooking from Dad’s ribcage.

“Atta boy,” Dad says, beaming and clicking a kiss against his forehead. Papyrus sighs at him. “Think you can swim over to Sans?”

Sans opens his arms. “What do you think, Paps? Wanna c’mere?”

Dad gently inches Papyrus away from him, keeping a hand balanced under his sternum. “Can you kick? Kick your legs? Kick, kick, kick—”

Papyrus grudgingly kicks his legs, and they move more slowly through the water—but they don’t hurt, he realizes. Usually such a vigorous movement would leave him cringing, but his spine seems a good deal happier about the water’s support than Papyrus himself is. He paddles forward, and Dad eases his hand back. Sans scoops Papyrus up as soon as he reaches him, grinning.

“Nice job, bro! You did just  _ swimmingly _ , _ ” _ he says. 

“That he did,” Piper agrees, walking towards them. Papyrus curls up in Sans’ arms, eyeing her uncertainly. “Think we can get him to go a little farther? Once he’s used to this, I’ll try some more focused exercises with him—but this is an awesome start.”

For some time, Papyrus paddles back and forth between Sans and Dad. It’s...fun, he realizes, a few minutes into it. It’s fun to be able to move without pain or stiffness. It’s fun seeing Dad’s face light up whenever Papyrus reaches him, or hearing Sans laugh when Papyrus does something silly like climb up onto his shoulders and then dive off. It’s fun getting to splash around with Sans. 

Then Piper introduces something new—a bright red ring. “Here,” she says, handing it to Sans. “Do you think you can get him to dive for this?”

“Absolutely.” Sans takes the ring, waving it in the air. “Papyrus, you remember how to play ball?” He tosses the ring, and it sinks quickly to the bottom of the pool. “Can you bring that to me? Can you go get it?”

Papyrus chuffs—of course he can—and dives, clawing his way through the water. The pressure on his bones increases as he gets deeper, but not frighteningly so. As a matter of fact, the pressure is...pleasant, soothing. He could stay there for a while, but he has a game to play, so he snatches up the ring and then bursts back onto the water surface. Sans hugs him when he returns the ring, cooing praise at him, and Papyrus wags his tail as quickly as he can through the water.

After that, Piper moves them to a shallower part of the pool and places Papyrus on a treadmill. Papyrus has used a treadmill before, of course—Master had wanted to see how long he could run without collapsing, a few different times. He can’t be blamed, then, for the way he suddenly begins to feel sick, and for the subtle way his bones begin to rattle—can’t be blamed, and can’t do anything to escape, either. They’ll hurt him if he does that, if he’s disobedient. Maybe not Dad, or Sans, but who  _ knows  _ about Piper? 

So he stands on the treadmill, his breathing beginning to speed, struggling to keep the rattle of his bones quietly. Fortunately, the water helps with that. The water muffles everything. The water will muffle him, when he collapses. He swallows hard at the thought, but he can’t throw up yet. He hasn’t even  _ started  _ the run. Master would be so disappointed—worse yet, Sans and Dad will be disappointed. He can’t disappoint them. He can’t, he can’t, he can’t, he—

“Wait,” Dad says, disapproval clear in his tone. Papyrus shudders and fights the urge to cower beneath the water’s surface. “No. We’re not doing this. He’s frightened.”

Arms slip around him, and he flinches—but it’s only Sans, lifting him out of the water and hugging him close. “It’s okay,” he says. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t wanna. This isn’t supposed to be scary.”

“Oh, poor dear.” Piper’s ears droop, and she smooths them back. “Perhaps we’d better call it a day. I don’t want to make this an unpleasant experience.”

“I think that’s wise. Sans, do you want to take him out of the water? Don’t leave the room yet, though. I don’t want the last thing that happened here to be negative. Piper, do you have any snacks, by chance?”

Sans sets Papyrus down near the edge of the pool, and Papyrus lays very, very still. For several minutes, he is made of fear and not much else. His bones rattle every few seconds, and his magic churns unhappily within his soul. Sans sits beside him the whole time, splashing his feet in the water as Dad and Piper talk quietly a few feet away. Gradually, Papyrus’ fear begins to ease. Nothing bad happens. It’s...strange, how often nothing bad happens. They just sit, and listen to the lap of the water and the quiet murmur of the other monsters in the room. Dad brings them snacks—packages of sweet gummies. Sans downs his readily, and Papyrus chews more slowly on his own. They’re too sweet, and they don’t sit well with his magic, but they’re comforting, nonetheless. They taste like affection. 

They go home, shortly after that, and Papyrus takes shelter under the couch until he forgets why he was upset in the first place.

* * *

Two weeks—that’s how long it takes the anti-anxiety medications to begin working. At least, that’s what Dad says. Papyrus isn’t sure what anti-anxiety medications  _ are,  _ or what they’re going to do for him (for either one of them), but Dad seems encouraged by the prospect. When the two week mark hits, Papyrus doesn’t feel any different. He just feels like  _ him.  _ Dad complains about headaches, and goes to talk to someone to get his dosage readjusted. It seems to help. Er, well. With the headaches, at least. Dad’s personality doesn’t really change after the two week mark, either.

Although—although perhaps Papyrus  _ does  _ notice that he’s less frightened when Sans leaves the room, or when other people enter his house, or when they pack up to go somewhere outside. It isn’t much; he’s still uncomfortable with the prospect, and he whines more often than not, but the fear isn’t the  _ only  _ thing he focuses on anymore. The nightmares, too, seem to fade in their intensity. Oh, he still has them, but when he wakes up he (usually) isn’t clawing the walls or gasping for breath. The world seems a tiny bit softer, a smidgen less intimidating. 

It’s not much, but it’s something.

He doesn’t know what Dad feels, but he hopes it’s something, too.

Each week they go down to visit Piper and the pool, and they swim and play and Piper makes him climb and balance on strange things and it’s odd, but no one hurts him or shouts at him or leaves him behind. He realizes that, although he’s usually sore after their time at the center, he’s starting to feel a tiny bit better physically. His spine isn’t quite as stiff and painful as it was just only weeks ago, and he can bound up and down the stairs almost as fast as Sans, now. Not  _ quite  _ as fast, though, because they’re different shapes.

...and that’s a problem, isn’t it? Papyrus doesn’t like this shape. He wants to walk on two legs, like Dad and Sans do now, because people who walk on two legs never get hurt. It’s always  _ blasters  _ who get hurt. Papyrus thought he was a blaster, but he thought Sans and Dad were a blaster, too, and they’re not, really. They can change shape, become something new, something  _ better _ —and if  _ they  _ can change shape, why can’t Papyrus?

He’d like to try, but he has no idea where he’d even begin. He can’t communicate his confusion, either, which is terribly frustrating. He tries to talk the way Sans does, but it usually doesn’t come across the way he wants it too. Dad just coos at him, and Sans laughs and assumes he means something he doesn’t. Oh, but he supposes he can’t blame them. Blasters aren’t meant to talk like real monsters do.

(He wants to be a real monster. He wants to be a real monster so  _ badly.) _

He grasps, distantly, that shifting has something to do with magic. He knows, too, that he has magic, much the same as he knows he has a tail, or paws, or a muzzle. What fails him is the knowledge of how to  _ use  _ that magic. Blue magic is alright, and fairly straightforward, though he doesn’t use it much because there’s no reason. Everything else eludes him. 

Sans, though! Sans uses magic  _ incredibly.  _ He can summon other blasters to do his bidding, he can lift things with blue magic as much as he wants, he can manipulate the gravity of the earth around them, he can change shape, he can do  _ anything.  _ Papyrus is constantly impressed, around him—especially when he and Dad do their weekly training sessions in the backyard. That’s what they’re doing now, as a matter of fact, while Papyrus sprawls out in the snow and chews on sticks and watches as they playfight. He’s not afraid to join them the way he used to be, but he’s got a tooth in the back of his mouth bothering him as it grows in, and chewing sounds better than playing, right about now.

As it turns out, Sans is teething, too! He’d shown Papyrus just that morning, wiggling a loose incisor with his thumb and looking speculatively at the bathroom mirror. “Huh. I guess that’s gonna fall out soon.”

...and that’s all that was said about it. He hadn’t mentioned it to Dad, so Papyrus assumes it’s normal. 

The snow crunches quietly behind him, and Papyrus whirls around, his eyes wide. The fire-man looks at him from across the yard, eyes equally wide. His voice a soft, slurred crackle of sound, he says, “Hi, Papyrus.”

Papyrus thumps his tail briefly against the snow.

“Grillby,” Dad says cheerfully, glancing over at him. (Sans seizes the chance to launch a tiny, harmless bone into his skull, and Dad yelps and stumbles backwards rather dramatically.)  _ “Youch— _ what are you doing here?”

_ Mello and Ipera sent me, actually. They’ve invited us over to meet their new baby. _

“Oh, that’s very kind of them. I’d love to, but—” His eyes flicker towards Papyrus, and guilt curls in Papyrus’ chest for a reason he can’t quite understand. “Papyrus around a baby may not be...such a good idea.”

“He wouldn’t hurt ‘em,” Sans says, crossing his arms over his chest. “He’s not mean.”

“No, but he’s easily startled, and babies are startling creatures.”

“I’ll just hold him, then.” Sans scoops him up, and Papyrus sighs but goes limp against him. “C’mon, let’s go. We can’t just  _ not  _ meet their baby.”

“Alright, alright—but I’ll hold him.” Dad takes Papyrus from Sans’ arms, then heads towards the street. Sans follows in his footsteps, trudging through the snow alongside the fire-man. Dad leads them to Waterfall, to a quaint little house on the river. He lets Papyrus hide in his coat at they enter the house, and Papyrus peeks over the edge of his collar. They’ve never been here before; it smells like salt and fish and something new and warm and soft.

“Hey, look who showed up,” someone loud and brash says, and a scaly monster looms in front of them. Papyrus shrinks further into Dad’s coat. “Welcome, Dr. Gaster, Sans, Grillbz—and little Papyrus. How are you?”

“We’re good, thank you,” Dad says, his voice rumbling through his sternum and into Papyrus’ bones. “Yourself?”

“Phenomenal,” the monster says, grinning from ear to ear—er, fin to fin. “Have you come to see the little fry?”

“We have,” Dad says, following the fish monster further into the house. The soft-new-warm smell grows stronger as they enter the living room, and Papyrus spies another monster—this one is covered in sleek red fur, and she cradles a small green bundle in her arms. Next to her, there’s another fish monster with a thatch of that same red fur atop his head. He’s not quite an adult, Papyrus thinks, but he must be years older than Sans.

“Hey, guys,” he says, glancing up. There’s a fond smile on his face. “What’s up?”

“Hello, Manta,” Dad says. “We’ve come to say hello to your new sister.”

Manta shuffles out of the way, and the furry monster beams at them. “Well, you’ve come to the right place. Say hi, fry,” the furry monster says, nuzzling her tiny bundle gently. The bundle coos—the bundle is  _ alive?  _ Papyrus’ eyes widen, and he sticks his head out of Dad’s collar to see better. The furry monster grins at him, sharp teeth and sharper eyes. Papyrus quickly averts his gaze. 

“Well, hi there,” Dad says, crouching in front of the couch and reaching out. The bundle stretches out a tiny blue hand and curls its fingers around one of Dad’s. Papyrus feels a pulse of warm affection from Dad’s soul, and a little flicker of jealously rears its head in his own soul. He whines, trying to squirm out of Dad’s parka so he can see just what all the fuss is about. “Easy, Paps. You’ve gotta be really gentle.”

Dad unbuttons his parka, setting Papyrus on the floor. Papyrus braces his front paws against the couch, leaning forward to sniff the bundle—Dad keeps a cautious hand on his back. The bundle, he decides, is where the new-warm-soft smell emanates from. Within the bundle, there’s the tiniest monster Papyrus has ever seen. Soft blue scales cover its skin, and a tuft of bright red fur adorns its head. It blinks up at him with two wary yellow eyes, and he blinks back. 

“What’s her name?” Sans asks, sitting down beside him. The fire-man leans against the wall on the far side of the room, where Papyrus can keep an eye on him in his peripheral vision. Manta crosses over to him, and the two of them begin to sign to each other.

“Undyne,” the furry monster says, keeping a close eye on Papyrus as he nudges the bundle. In retribution, the bundle whacks him with one solid fist. He yelps and burrows back against Dad, his eyes wide. 

“Oh, Paps,” Dad says, but there’s a laugh in his tone. “Careful, bud. She’ll getcha. She’s active already, isn’t she?”

“Oh, yes,” the furry monster says, her eyes brightening. “Very much so. She’s a little fighter, and she’s got a temper.”

“Just like her mother,” the fish monster teases from behind them. 

“Just like her mother,” the furry monster agrees, smoothing one gentle paw over the tiny monster’s head. The tiny monster latches onto her, beginning to mouth at one furry knuckle. “Are we hungry, fry?”

“I’ll get the shrimp eggs,” the fish monster says, already heading for the kitchen.

Ew. Papyrus does not enjoy the thought of shrimp eggs. If Dad’s grimace is anything to go by, neither does he. Sans leans forward, peering curiously at the tiny monster. “Hey,” he says, and the monster stares up at him, rapt. The color of her eyes is...familiar. It reminds Papyrus of someone, and he gives his bones an uncomfortable rattle. Dad scoops him back into his arms, bouncing him gently.

“Was the hatching very difficult?” he asks the furry monster. The two of them begin to talk over Papyrus’ head, as adults are so very fond of doing, and he sits and listens and watches the tiny monster with an odd blend of discontentment and curiosity. She’s interesting enough, he supposes, but not worth all this fuss. He would much rather Dad and Sans being fussing over  _ him. _

He’s glad when they leave, although he can’t quite get the tiny monster out of his mind for the rest of the day. Undyne. What a strange name for a strange little creature. When they get back to the house, Dad lets him go, and he hides under the couch to think. Thinking is easier, in the dark and the quiet, and no one bothers him until dinnertime. 

* * *

The fire-man is babysitting again, because Dad has gone to work for a few hours. Dad has been doing that for the last few weeks, and Papyrus can tell it upsets Sans. After Dad leaves, his big brother gets quieter, and less happy, and he doesn’t move as much. He keeps watching the windows. Papyrus supposes he doesn’t like it when Dad leaves, either. After all, who  _ knows  _ if—or when—Dad will coming back? Besides, Dad always showers right after he comes home, but Papyrus still manages to catch a whiff of the scents on him—chemicals, sanitation,  _ lab.  _ It makes him uncomfortable, and he won’t go near Dad for at least an hour after he returns. It always spoils his homecoming.

Fortunately, Dad hasn’t ever been gone for  _ too  _ long. He’s certainly never been gone for a whole day. Papyrus doesn’t want to know how Sans would tolerate that. Actually, he gets a feeling Sans  _ wouldn’t  _ tolerate that, and that’s exactly why it hasn’t happened. 

_ Sans?  _ the fire-man asks, poking his head into the living room.  _ Would you like to help me make lunch? _

“No thanks,” Sans says, staring morosely at the TV, where  _ Star Trek  _ is playing. 

_ Alright. Anything particular you’d like to eat? _

“Nuh-uh.”

Papyrus nibbles gently at Sans’ pant leg, trying to coax his brother off of the couch. He play-bows, then races to grab one of their toys—a squeaky ball. He squeaks it enthusiastically in his jaws, shaking his head vigorously before dropping it at Sans’ feet and looking hopefully at him. A smile flickers across Sans’ face.

“You wanna play, huh?” He scoops up the ball, squeaking it gently before tossing it across the living room. “Go get it, bud.”

Papyrus races after the ball, pouncing on it and giving it a sound chewing before prancing back to Sans. He drops it, and Sans throws it, but there’s no real enthusiasm in his playing. Papyrus whines quietly at him, and Sans flashes a halfhearted smile in his direction again. 

“Papyrus?” the fire-man calls from behind them, and Papyrus whirls around, offering him his full attention.  _ Would you like to come and watch me cook? _

Papyrus doesn’t understand much of the fire-man’s strange hand language, but he  _ does  _ recognize “come” and “cook.” He also understands that cooking means food, so he casts one last worried glance in Sans’ direction before bounding into the kitchen. He slips underneath the kitchen table, snuffling the air as the fire-man cooks. Every few minutes, a stray ingredient will find its way onto the plate the fire-man sets on the floor for him, and he’ll snap it up and wag his tail. The tastes and scents of the kitchen are compelling, and much more entertaining than a moody Sans. (Even so, Papyrus can’t resist a peek into the living room every few minutes, just to make sure Sans is still there.)

Lunch, once it’s finished, is dino-shaped chicken nuggets, mac ‘n cheese, and peas. Papyrus wolfs down the first two quite happily, but eyes the peas more skeptically. Still, he knows better than to waste food. He eats his peas, too, albeit more slowly. Sans pokes with unusual boredom at his own food. After a moment, he sits back and begins to stir his chocolate milk contemplatively with a bright pink bendy straw.

“Grillby?” he asks.

_ Yes, Sans? _

“Are you and dad boyfriends now? Since you share soulmagic?”

Wow. Papyrus didn’t know the fire-man—Grillby, is it Grillby? People keep calling him Grillby—could turn  _ pink.  _ Grillby sputters, gulping down his mouthful of mac ‘n cheese before beginning to sign,  _ I—no, no, nothing like that. Sharing magic is entirely platonic. _

“Oh.” Sans frowns, sipping his milk. “But you like him, don’t you?”

_ Of course I do. He’s a very good friend. _

“No,  _ like- _ like him.”

Grillby laughs.  _ Like-like him, huh? What makes you say that? _

“Well, you obviously care a lot about him. That’s why you gave him your soulmagic, and that’s why you make us lunch, and spend all this time babysitting us, and—”

_ Now, that’s not  _ just  _ for him. I enjoy spending time with you two, too. You’re my friends, are you not? _

Sans’ smile feels a little more real, this time. “Yeah. But  _ some  _ of that it is because of Dad, right?”

Grillby inclines his head in agreement.

“But lots of people love him enough to do that stuff too, like Asgore and Alphys. You’re all his best friends, you all like him, but  _ you—”  _ Sans points. “You  _ like- _ like him. You turn pink if he compliments you, and every time you look at him you get this gooey look in your eyes and your flames get brighter. You always dress nice when you come to see us, even if you’re just gonna be babysitting.”

Grillby glances down at his sweater vest, then clears his throat.  _ Well—well, I usually dress nice. I’m a bartender. _

“You don’t dress nice when you pick us up from Alphys’ or Asgore’s,” Sans points out. “I’ve  _ seen  _ you in a sweatshirt, okay? Plus, you’re  _ always  _ making fries. It’s bad for his diet, you know. Make him eat something healthy at some point in his life.”

Grillby groans and folds down over the table, burying his face in his arms.  _ I just want him to be happy. Oh, stars. Is it that obvious? _

Sans waits until Grillby glances up to see his signing before he responds. “Probably not. Nobody else is around the two of you enough to notice. I doubt Dad even knows.”

Grillby exhales a quiet plume of smoke.  _ No. I doubt he does. Even if he did, I doubt he’d want—well. No point dwelling on it. _

“No, c’mon, Grillbz.” Sans leans forward, swinging his legs and pushing his plate towards Papyrus. Papyrus gently nibbles the head off of a ketchup-soaked t-rex. “You know how he is. He doesn’t pick up on a lot of social cues. If you want him to notice, you’re gonna need to say something.”

Grillby’s flames shudder.  _...no. I couldn’t do that to him. He’s got enough to worry about. _

“So this would be something he  _ doesn’t  _ have to worry about,” Sans says earnestly. “Something to make him happy. You make him happy, man, I know you do. He doesn’t smile at anyone the way he smiles at you, and he’s always calmer after you’ve been around.”

_ And you think he’d...want that? A life with me? _

“I mean, I can’t speak for him, but I know he cares a lot about you. If I didn’t think you’d make him happy, I wouldn’t ask.”

_ And what about you? Would this make you happy? _

Sans shrugs. “I just want Dad to be happy again. You could do it.”

_ Sans.  _ Grillby frowns, his flames dimming some.  _ Your father needs to do what’s best for all of you. I don’t want to place myself anywhere I don’t belong. You will always be his priority, and I don’t want to interfere with that. Relationships take attention, and if me taking that attention from your father is going to upset you, I don’t want to do it. _

“You think I’d be  _ jealous?” _

_ I think that you and your father need each other very much, right now, and I don’t want to come between you.  _ He glances at Papyrus, then adds,  _ Between any of you. If I am to court your father, I’ll do it when I’m sure it’s going to make  _ all  _ of us happier. _

“It would make me happier to see him happier,” Sans says. He reaches out, resting a head absently on Papyrus’ skull. Papyrus warbles softly at him. “He deserves it. Plus, I mean—I like you, Grillbz. We’re friends. I don’t have a problem with you bein’ around more often, or even with you taking Dad on dates or whatever it is grown-ups do when they like-like each other. Just as long as you’re not gone too long, anyway. So don’t  _ not  _ ask him to hang out just because you think it’s gonna hurt  _ my  _ feelings.”

Grillby exhales softly.  _ I’m glad you’re willing, Sans. I don’t know that he’ll be as willing to part from you as you are from him, though. You and Papyrus are his entire world, his sun and sky, and he loves you more than anything. He may not have time for something like— _ He gestures vaguely at himself.

“Well, you won’t know unless you ask, right?”

_ I suppose not.  _ Grillby sips his own chocolate milk, his eyes distant and contemplative.  _ I can’t promise you anything, but I’ll think about it. _

Sans grins. “Cool. I’ll take it.”

The two of them continue to chatter as they eat. Sans helps wash the dishes, and Papyrus yawns and curls up in front of the couch to watch whatever history documentary Grillby has pulled up. Barely an hour later, he hears the jingle of keys that signals his father’s return, and he stares at the door, panting in excitement.

“Dad!” Sans rushes and leaps into Dad’s arms as soon as the door is open, and Dad stumbles backwards, laughing and hugging him close. “You’re back!”

“I am indeed,” Dad says, nuzzling up against Sans as he steps into the house. “Hello, Papyrus, Grillby. How is everyone?”

“We’re good.” Sans relaxes in Dad’s arms, seemingly content to rest there as Dad drops his bag and sheds his parka. Papyrus grimaces (smells like  _ lab)  _ and slinks beneath the couch. The three of them chatter for a few minutes, and then Dad pries himself out of Sans’ grip and heads upstairs to shower. Grillby says his goodbyes once Dad returns to the living room, then slips out. Their evening proceeds, then, as it always does. Dad plays cars with them both, then does physical therapy with Papyrus and reads with Sans. After that, he sends them both upstairs to bathe as he prepares dinner, and they eat around the kitchen table. Next, they settle in to watch cartoons, and Dad works on his papers by lamplight (he looks dreadfully unhappy as he does). Then it’s bedtime. 

“Goodnight, Sans,” Dad says, kissing Sans’ forehead gently before doing the same to Papyrus, who clicks his teeth happily. “And goodnight, Papyrus. I love you both, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Night, Dad,” Sans murmurs, his eyes already half-shut. “Love you too.”

Papyrus chirrups his agreement, burrowing up against Sans. He doesn’t shut his eyes for several long moments, content to stare out at their little rocket-shaped nightlight. Beside him, Sans lies still and quiet, but he isn’t sleeping, either. It’s going to be one of  _ those  _ nights. Papyrus can already tell. 

Sure enough, after almost an hour, Sans rolls out of bed and rubs his eyes. “C’mon, Paps,” he says. “Let’s go.”

Papyrus picks up his favorite blanket in his jaws, dragging it along behind him as he follows Sans down the hallway. They creep into their father’s room, and Sans climbs onto his bed and jostles him gently. Dad jerks awake, his eyes wide—but he settles as soon as he recognizes Sans. “Sans? What’s wrong?”

“I had a bad dream,” Sans whispers, curling up next to Dad. “Can I stay here please?”

Dad stretches—a long, shivering thing—and then wraps his arms around Sans and drags him closer, curling up around him. Papyrus springs up, circling a few times before laying down at the far edge of the bed. Dad flops a hand out to him, and Papyrus nibbles his fingers affectionately before scooting just a teeny bit closer. The three of them sleep there—inseparable, as they so often, often are. 

When Papyrus sleeps, he dreams. He dreams of the Staff, of shattered bones and terrified screams and cold, clinical cages. He snaps awake breathing hard and rattling, and then Dad is there, standing up and scooping him up off of the bed and into his arms. At first, Papyrus holds as still as he can, petrified to make a wrong move and bring Dad’s wrath down on him the way he had brought Master’s, so very many times. He wants to be  _ good.  _ He wants so badly to be good, but he doesn’t know  _ how.  _

What he does know is that Dad has never hurt him for being still and quiet, and so he does that. He keeps his eyes squeezed shut, trying to muffle the annoying clatter of his bones. Dad begins to hum a soft, familiar tune, and then he’s moving. It’s a slow, rhythmic movement that makes Papyrus want to relax. Warily, Papyrus cracks an eye open and discovers that Dad is swaying in place with Papyrus bundled gently against his chest. He looks half-awake, his eyelights dim and his sockets lidded. 

“It’s okay,” he murmurs sleepily, leaning his head against Papyrus’. “It’s okay, Papyrus. I’ve got you. We’re safe.”

Papyrus takes a deep, shivering breath. He wants desperately to relax, to take comfort in Dad the way Sans seems so able to, but his body refuses to let him. It’s convinced (as, indeed, a large part of him is) that he’s going to be shouted at, that he’s being  _ bad,  _ that he’s going to be  _ hurt.  _ No matter how many times Dad proves him wrong, the fears plague him. It’s beyond frustrating. He makes a cracked, miserable sound and digs his claws into Dad’s shoulders.

“Easy.” Dad nuzzles their heads together, squeezing him gently. “Easy, sweetheart, it’s alright. Daddy’s right here. I’m not gonna let anybody hurt you, not ever, ever again. You don’t have to be scared.”

It’s so strange, how gentle monsters can sound. Even after months away from Master, Papyrus still isn’t used to it. Before, he never knew voices could sound like that—soft and easy and undemanding. The tone makes his eyes sting, and his breath hitches unsteadily. Tears roll from his eyesockets, wobbling on the edge of his jaw before splattering onto Dad’s shoulder.

...Papyrus isn’t used to crying, either. He’d stopped after he realized it didn’t make Master gentler with him—he’d stopped when he realized it was useless and he was helpless and he would never, ever be anything but. The few times he’s cried since then he’s been overwhelmed or terrified or both. He doesn’t know why he’s crying now. He doesn’t know, but he is, and Dad notices.

“Oh, Papyrus.” Dad’s voice cracks at the edges, and he kisses Papyrus’ skull. “Oh, honey. That’s okay. That’s okay, you can cry. I’m not going anywhere. We can take as long as you need.”

As it turns out, Papyrus needs hours. Tears continue to roll from his eyesockets, and he shivers and buries himself against Dad and cries and cries and cries and doesn’t know why. Dad wraps him up in a blanket, swaddling him so his limbs are held close to his own body, and that helps, a little. The pressure makes him feel safer. His tears start to trail off—and then he thinks of Master, and how he never ever felt safe like this before, and the tears start right back up.

Dad, as he promised, never leaves. He cradles Papyrus through the darkest of the night, murmuring soft comfort and rocking him slowly. He fetches him a bottle of warm milk, and snuggles his stuffed bear into the blankets with him, and sings little snatches of lullabies under his breath. Papyrus cries himself to sleep shortly before dawn, and he sleeps longer than he thinks he ever has.

When he wakes up, the lights outside are shining brightly, and he hears the soft call of songbirds in the snow. Dad sprawls out beside him, drool patching his pillow. Sans sits up next to him, leaning back against the headboard with one of Dad’s textbooks cradled in his hands. “Hey,” he says, when he notices Papyrus looking at him. “Good morning, sunshine.”

Papyrus yawns, and then, for the very first time, he rolls over and goes back to sleep—because even if nightmares haunt him, he knows he’ll wake up at home, and Dad and Sans will be right there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: according to a very brief google search, baby fish are called "fries" which is, imo, the world's most adorable nickname for bby fish monsters


	33. your work will not be forgotten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: none !!!
> 
> “Intelligence...that hasn’t been tempered by human affection isn’t worth a damn.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes
> 
> and we have an adoRABLE AND HILARIOUS PICTURE [HERE](https://purropurro.tumblr.com/post/616545808811163648/another-shitpost-for-parsnipit-hope-you-enjoy%22) of papyrus and his Hiding in gaster's coat by @purropurro!!! thANK U FRIEND!!!!

“Good morning, Your Majesty,” Gaster says, bobbing a curt little bow in his king’s direction. Asgore gapes at him. “I have business to discuss with you.”

_ “Wingdings?” _

“None other.”

“What are you doing here? This is my official business time, I can’t just—”

“I know. I mean to discuss official business,” Gaster says. “From a Royal Scientist to his liege. May I have a moment of your time?”

“Oh, it squicks me out to hear you stand on such formalities.” Asgore grimaces, flapping a hand at him. “Whatever you want to discuss, we can discuss as friends, over a cup of tea. You needn’t corner me during my working hours, you know. Unless this is a matter that concerns the whole of the kingdom, I don’t see—”

“I’m resigning.”

Asgore goes very, very still.

“I’m sorry,” Gaster says, his eyelights skittering away. He can’t bear to see Asgore’s disappointment, when it inevitably comes. “I don’t make this decision lightly. You know I’ve loved working for you in this capacity, but I can’t do it any longer. For my children, for myself, I need to step back. I can no longer function as I should. This kingdom deserves someone passionate about and fully invested in their work, and right now, I’m afraid that’s not something I’m capable of. I understand if this upsets you, and I know it’s an inconvenience, and for that, I apologize, but—”

Asgore stand up and hugs him, and Gaster freezes.

“What—? What are you—?”

“I’m so proud of you,” Asgore says, and Gaster’s chest tightens. He swallows rapidly. “My little one. You think I haven’t seen? I know. I know this job isn’t easy for you any longer. It isn’t making you happy, and I’m so glad you can admit that to me.”

“Then you—it’s okay? I can—I can stop?”

“Of course you can. Of course.” Asgore brings a hand up to cradle the back of his skull. “I would never keep you here if it hurts you. You are more important to me than your work. You understand that, don’t you? I love you more than I love anything you have done for me.”

Gaster’s breath hitches.

“Wingdings? Are you—?” Asgore begins to lean back, but Gaster tightens his grip, burying his face against the king’s shoulder. The thick purple fabric there easily absorbs his tears. “Oh, dear. Oh, hush, now, my little one. There, there. I know this must not be easy for you, but I am so proud, and you are so wise for deciding what’s best for you and your family. I promise I’m not upset with you.”

“I’m sorry,” Gaster says, anyway, because it’s just what makes  _ sense. _

“Don’t be,” Asgore says, rubbing his spine briskly. “This isn’t the end of the world. You’ve been my Royal Scientist longer than I had any right to expect—stars know it’s about time you retired.”

Gaster hums uncomfortably.

“You...aren’t retiring, are you?”

He leans back, scrubbing at his eyes, and Asgore keeps a gentle hand on his shoulder. “I—they were looking for a professor of physics and engineering at the University, and I went to talk with them last week—just to talk!—but they offered me the job on the spot if I wanted it and I told them I’d think about it and I have and I think it would be a really wonderful opportunity and Asgore I’m sorry I’m really sorry—”

Asgore hauls him back into a hug again, hushing him softly. “Shhh. Stop apologizing. If this is what’s best for you, then it’s what I want you to do.”

“I wanted to keep being the Royal Scientist.”

“Did you want to keep being the Royal Scientist, or did you want to  _ want  _ to keep being the Royal Scientist?”

Gaster falters. “I—I just—agh!” He flaps his hands in bitter frustration. “I’m so  _ angry  _ that Jackson did this to me. I love science, Asgore. I  _ love  _ it. I’ve always loved it, for as long as I can remember, and I’ve loved being your Royal Scientist. It’s incredible. I was so lucky to have this job, but now—Jackson’s ruined that, too.”

“My poor boy,” Asgore murmurs, his voice laced with sadness. “You have every right to be upset about that.”

“I just want to love science. I want to feel like I used to about it. I want to be  _ excited  _ about inventing, I want to be passionate about my work, I want to feel something other than  _ terror  _ when I think about creating!” He grinds his teeth, balling his hands into fists.

“All in good time,” Asgore assures him. “I, er—hope, anyhow. Maybe you’ll never love science the way you did, and that’s a tragedy, Wingdings, but you can still be happy. You’ll learn to love other things.”

Gaster lets out a slow, resigned breath. He’s agonized about this before and come to the same conclusion each time. There is nothing he can do to force himself to fall back in love with science. There is nothing that will heal this wound of his but time and hope and work. “...yes. Perhaps.”

“But a professor! Wingdings, that’s incredible! You’re so perfectly suited for it—I could think of no one more qualified.” Asgore claps him on the shoulder, beaming. “Are you excited?”

“I’m nervous.”

“Whatever for?”

“What if I’m not good at it? I know I have a hard time bringing things down to a student’s level.”

“You’ve taught Sans, haven’t you? You have lots of practice, now.”

That...is comforting to realize. “That’s true. But I’m not exactly  _ relatable.  _ I’m spastic, and eccentric, and I have odd habits, and I ramble, and I’ve not been taught how to teach, and—”

“And you’re just like every other professor out there,” Asgore assures him. “You’re going to be wonderful. I just know it. So am I to assume this is your two weeks’ notice, then?”

“Yes.” Stars, what a relief it is to finally say that. Two weeks and he  _ never  _ has to set foot in a lab again. He never has to come home reeking of chemicals and bad memories. He never has to slink past an operating room with his bones rattling or wonder wonder  _ wonder  _ about the wellbeing of the white rats running mazes in the biology department. “I’m planning to use my last two weeks to train my replacement, if that’s alright with you.”

“You’ve found a replacement already?”

“I have a strong suggestion.”

“A pleasant way of saying an order,” Asgore says, a smile flickering across his face. He sits back down in his throne, motioning for Gaster to continue.

“I’ve reviewed all of our employee files and considered my options carefully,” Gaster begins. “This will be your choice, ultimately, but I hope you’ll take my advice into account. There are hundreds of brilliant scientists in our labs, and many of them would make phenomenal Royal Scientists. There is one scientist in particular, however, who has caught my eye with her enthusiasm and ingenuity.” 

“I remember,” Asgore says, fond, “when Toriel told me the very same thing about you.”

Gaster can’t quite keep a smile from flickering across his face. “She’s young, I’ll admit, and inexperienced. She was born Underground, so she has little concept of the Surface and the reasons we fight. My trust in her has been...questionable, at times, but I believe with close supervision, she’ll flourish.”

“And who will be doing that supervising?”

“I will, naturally. I’m good friends with her, and I’ll be sure to keep an eye out. Moreover, though—” He reaches into his carrier bag, pulling out a folder and handing it to Asgore. “A proposal for you, Your Majesty. I want to establish a Board of Ethics to oversee the science departments’ experiments.”

Asgore’s eyebrows raise, and he opens the folder, glancing over the papers.

“I know Jackson didn’t operate legally,” Gaster admits, exhaling softly, “so there is little even this Board could have done to stop him. Still, it would put my mind at ease, knowing that there’s a team overseeing our own research and ensuring it stays within our moral boundaries. Naturally, this Board would also responsible for keeping the new Royal Scientist in line.”

“It sounds like a good idea, but it will take time to put something like that in place,” Asgore says uncertainly. “Do you already have an idea of who would serve on the Board?”

“I’ve listed suggestions in my proposal,” Gaster says, gesturing at the folder, “along with suggestions as to rules and functionalities. It’s a very rough start, but it would mean a lot to me if you’d consider it—a lot to me as your friend, Asgore.”

“Of course I’ll consider it, Wingdings. I value your advice.”

“Thank you,” Gaster says, his voice warm. “Of course, as I’m resigning, Alphys will have to play a part in designing the Board, too. I—”

“Alphys?”

Gaster blinks, then laughs. “Oh, yes! Why, I’d completely forgotten I was hedging about that. I want Dr. Alphys to replace me as your Royal Scientist.”

“Dr. Alphys, hm?” Asgore closes the folder, stroking his beard. “She’s enthusiastic, I’ll give you that. Are you sure she’ll take to such an, erm, professional job?”

“I believe she can, given the proper guidance. And of course I won’t be abandoning her after my two weeks are up—she’s always welcome to approach me for advice, as are you. I don’t want to leave either of you floundering, but I just—” He gestures vaguely in the direction of the lab. “I can’t be there any longer, not every day. It’s too much.”

“I understand.” Asgore takes a deep breath, then meets his eyes. “Let me think about it. I’ll let you know my decision tomorrow, so you can begin your training before you leave.”

“Brilliant.” Gaster beams, clasping his hands behind his back and bobbing in one final, quick bow. “In that case, I’ll be taking my leave, Your Majesty.”

“Goodbye, Wingdings. And hey?”

“Hm?”

“Thank you,” Asgore says, his eyes shining. “Thank you for everything you have done for me—for the Underground—as a Royal Scientist. Your work will not be forgotten.”

_ No,  _ Gaster thinks as he leaves the palace. His work will not be forgotten. His work lights the entire Underground. His work turns wheels and moves conveyer belts and establishes long-distance communication. His work brings day and night, his work brings hot and cold, his work brings  _ power.  _ His work is the Core of the Underground.

(His work is the memory of two hundred and sixteen slaughtered children, and it is a pair of skeletons running around Snowdin with the stars in their eyes. The world will forget him, but Asgore is right—it will not forget his work.)

* * *

“So you’re gonna be a teacher?” Sans asks, his face creased into a thoughtful little frown.

“Mm-hm. A grown-up teacher. I’m going to teach physics and engineering instead of working at the lab.”

“Huh.”

“Do you—like that idea?”

“Yeah,” Sans says, after a second of contemplation. “Yeah, I like it a lot, actually. You’re a good teacher. Do  _ you  _ like that idea?”

Gaster smiles, ruffling a hand over his son’s skull. “I do, as a matter of fact. I’m pretty excited.”

“So how long will you have to be gone every day?”

Ah. He knew that question was coming. He leans back against the couch cushions, and Sans climbs into his lap and cuddles against his chest. “I’ll have two lecture sections on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, so that’s three hours on each of those days. Then I’ll have three office hours on the same days, which makes six.”

Sans’ fingers curl into his shirt.

“On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I’ll have two physics labs, so that’ll also be six.”

“That’s too long,” Sans says immediately.

“Sans, I’ve left you for longer than that before.”

“Yeah, but not  _ every day!  _ You can’t be gone that long. Besides, who’s gonna watch us that often? Grillby and Alphys and Asgore have jobs too, y’know.”

“I know,” Gaster soothes, patting Sans’ head. “The University has a daycare.” 

A daycare that is very, very far from any particularly tempting evidence lockers.

Sans relaxes some. “Oh. So we’ll get to see you during the day?”

“You sure will. We can even eat lunch together.” It will be a good transition, he hopes, towards getting Sans ready for school, when he  _ won’t  _ be able to see Gaster every few hours. Papyrus, on the other hand, still concerns him. Evidently, Sans has the same concerns.

“What about Papyrus?”

“What about Papyrus,” Gaster agrees. “It’s going to be hard for him. I’ve spoken with a few of the daycare providers, and they’ve agreed to keep him in the infant nursery. He’s a bit old for it, but it will be calmer there.”

“I thought babies cried a lot?”

“I said calmer, not quieter. The babies in this nursery aren’t old enough to run or play, so there won’t be anyone to climb all over him or tug his tail or get into his space. The noise will be a learning curve, I’ll admit, but I think he can do it. If he gets overwhelmed, I’ve already let the providers know that they need only call me and I’ll pick him up right away. I’ve discussed his psychological issues with them, so they’ll be mindful of him. I think he’s going to be okay.”

...Gaster really,  _ really  _ hopes he’s going to be okay. Papyrus  _ needs  _ to be socialized before it’s too late. Besides, he’d done well with Undyne, and his magic use is still limited. He’s been adapting readily to his new life, thus far, but that’s no excuse for complacency. Recovery is never finished.

...what an exhausting reality.

Gaster takes a deep breath to continue, but before he can, there’s a rapid knocking on the door. He sets Sans down on the couch, then trots over to open it. The second the door is open, a tiny yellow body slams into his. Alphys’ arms seize tightly around his waist, and he stumbles backwards with a startled yelp.

“Oh, Dr. Gaster, thank you t-thank you thank you thank you  _ thank you thank—” _

“Heh heh. I guess Asgore told you, huh?”

“—you thank you thank you thank you—”

“Well, look who it is,” Sans says, grinning and peeking over the edge of the couch. Papyrus bounds up to stand beside him, paws braced on the back of the couch and head cocked. “Our new Royal Scientist.”

“I don’t know how I’ll ever r-repay you,” Alphys says, her talons pricking his spine through his sweater.

“Hey. Hey, hey.” He crouches in front of her, gently extracting himself from her grip. He rests his hands on her shoulders, and two teary eyes meet his. He lowers his voice so the children won’t hear, and then he  _ chills  _ his voice, and Alphys’ eyes begin to widen in fear. “I’ll tell you exactly how you’re gonna do it. You’re going to take care of what you create, and you’re going to make sure everyone else does the same thing. If you don’t, I will know, and I will be  _ very angry.  _ Yes?”

Alphys swallows hard. She trembles beneath his hands. “Y-yes, sir.”

He relaxes, beaming at her and clapping her shoulders gently. “Then by the stars, congratulations, Dr. Alphys! Don’t look so frightened! This is going to be a wonderful career; you’ve got a bright future ahead of you. Now, we’ll need to start your training right away—we haven’t got long. Of course, there’s not too much to learn. A lot of it is independent work. Sans, Papyrus, darlings, let’s get dressed. I’m going to drop you off with Grillby while—”

“Can I come with you?” Sans asks.

“What?”

“To the lab? Can I come with you?”

“Well, er—what about Papyrus? We can’t leave him on his own, and he wouldn’t like the lab.”

“He can stay in your office. It doesn’t look or smell like a lab. C’mon, please, Dad?”

“Well, I suppose. Are you sure, though?” Gaster says. “You really want to?”

Sans nods rapidly. “I wanna say goodbye to everyone.”

“Alright, then.”

By the time they reach the lab, Gaster has already gone through most of Alphys’ list of responsibilities with her—he’s written one out, too, just in case she forgets anything. He leads her to her office (which he’s already begun to pack into neat little cardboard boxes) and gives her the tour after gently prying Papyrus out of his coat and setting him in the office chair. “This is your official computer—I’ve wiped it clean, save for everything vital, which you’ll find in this folder here, and—”

“Dr. Gaster?” A small whimsun stands in his office door, their hands clasped in front of them. Papyrus clicks his teeth nervously, huddling down against the chair, and Sans pats him gently.

“Hey, Lucky,” Gaster says, flashing a smile in their direction. 

“Are you—are you leaving today?”

“No, no, just starting our training. Meet your new Royal Scientist, Dr. Alphys.” He sweeps a hand grandly at her, and Lucky flicks their wings respectfully.

“Pleasure to meet you, ma’am,” they say. “I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t going to miss my chance to tell you goodbye, Dr. Gaster, but I’d better be on my way. We’re cooking up something special in the chemistry lab.”

“Can I come?” Sans asks, stepping forward.

Lucky and Gaster both look at him, startled. Lucky starts, “Well—well, I suppose that’s up to your father.”

“Can I?” Sans glances back at Gaster. There’s something hesitant in his face—nervous, uncertain. “Please? I promise I’ll behave. I just—I want—”

He flails his hands helplessly, and Gaster understands. His eyes soften. “Hey, it’s okay. Go on. Have fun.”

Sans’ eyes light up. “Really?”

“Yeah. Just be good, alright?”

“Alright! Thanks, pops—you’re the best!” Sans bounds after Lucky, already talking enthusiastically to them about the experiments upstairs. It’s bittersweet, Gaster thinks. How he yearns for that feeling himself, for that curiosity, for that  _ zeal— _ on the other hand, he’s glad to know that even if  _ he  _ can’t feel it any longer, his son can. 

As soon as Sans is gone, Gaster buckles down and gets to his training. He keeps it short today, since he doesn’t want to keep the boys here for too very long. Papyrus already looks bored out of his mind. “You can stay here,” Gaster offers to Alphys as he packs up his things. “Get to know everyone, explore the lab, brainstorm some new ideas. Think you can handle it?”

Alphys hesitates, wringing her hands. “I—I hope so.”

“Alphys.” He crouches in front of her, and her eyes skitter nervously towards him before darting away again. He can’t blame her for her fear. “I wouldn’t have suggested you if I didn’t think you could handle this. I know I’ve been harsh with you. I know I’ll be harsh with you. I don’t want you making the same mistakes that I did, and I’m going to do everything in my power to keep that from happening, no matter what.”

“I-is this supposed to be comforting?”

He cracks a grin. “Things have a funny way of not turning out the way they’re supposed to. What I mean to say is that I  _ do  _ believe in you. You’re not going to make my mistakes. You are more than capable of doing this. Out of everyone in the Underground, I chose you. That, coming from the guy who trusts scientists pretty much not at all? I’d like to think it’s a compliment.”

“You don’t trust me.”

“Absolutely no I do not. But I could say the same for anyone here—it’s not personal. Besides, I trust you more than most. I’m confident that you can manage these rowdy scientists. If you need help, ask for it. Now, I’ll admit, that’s a hard lesson to learn—but learning is what we love, isn’t it? We’re scientists.”

Alphys takes a deep breath, then nods. “R-right. Right, okay. I’ll try my b-best.”

“That’s all I can ask.” He reaches out, setting a hand on her head. “Be good, Dr. Alphys. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“See you, Dr. Gaster,” she calls, waving at him as he scoops Papyrus up, slips out of his—out of  _ her  _ office, and goes to fetch his son. 

* * *

The celebratory dinner is a surprise and a half. Stars, practically everyone he knows is there. There are patrons from the bar, employees from the capital, nearly every scientist from the labs—among the crowd he finds Lucky and Uthiop and Matrissa, Thresh and Belous and Erika, Ipera and Mello, Greater Dog and Lesser Dog and Doggo and the Dogi, Fuku and Manti and little Undyne, Alphys and Asgore and Grillby. When he looks on them all, their eyes bright and shining with joy for him, his soul feels fuller than it ever has.

Sans darts off as soon as Gaster gives him the okay, latching himself to Fuku’s side. The two of them weave their way around the room greeting friends and strangers alike. Gaster glances nervously at Grillby, who inclines his head and keeps their children under a watchful eye. Gaster himself keeps Papyrus hidden in his parka—this would be a bit  _ much  _ for him without the security he finds there, tucked against Gaster’s chest and swallowed by heavy brown fabric.

“Asgore, what is this?” he asks, when the king joins him in the doorway. One warm, furry arms comes to settle around his shoulders, squeezing him close.

“Just a little get-together.” Asgore winks, ruffling a paw over his skull. “Consider it a thank you for being my Royal Scientist all these years. When your scientists found out you were leaving, they all wanted a chance to say goodbye—then word got around, and everyone else wanted a chance to congratulate you, too. Everyone is so proud of you, Wingdings. Give them a chance to show it.”

“I—stars, I want to, but the boys—they might get overwhelmed, they might—”

“I know,” Asgore soothes. “If either of them—or  _ you— _ start to get overwhelmed, head upstairs to the bedroom. No one will bother you there, and if you tell me to, I’ll start herding everyone out of here. Okay?”

Gaster takes a deep breath, then nods. “Okay.” He peeks down into the collar of his parka, and Papyrus stares up at him. “Okay, Papyrus?”

His son warbles softly. He takes that as a yes.

They drift around the room, shaking hands and exchanging hugs and laughing over old stories. Thresh bounds up to him within the half-hour, thrusting a large, wrapped box into his arms. “Here!” they say, tapping one fine talon against the box. “This for you, milquetoast. You been looking all strange and lost without it.”

Gaster blinks in surprise, setting the box down and tearing through the wrapping paper. He pulls out a length of heavy black fabric, and—oh. His soul wrenches, and a wobbly smile washes over his face. “This—my old jacket? How did you—?”

“Not your old jacket,” Thresh says, glancing away. “I’m no wizard. Couldn’t have repaired that if I’d tried. Tore all to hell, poor coat. But I remembered what it looked like, how it moved, how it felt, and so—” They flail an arm at the coat. “Good recreation?”

“The best,” Gaster breathes, hugging it to himself—then he reaches out and he pulls Thresh into a hug, too. They squawk in surprise, their eyes widening. “Thank you, Thresh. Thank you for everything.”

Thresh stays stiff for a second, then leans slowly into his side and wraps an arm around his waist, giving him the gentlest squeeze. “Haven’t even heard the best yet, silly man. I imbued the fabric with some of my magic, so it’s like your boys’ clothes—it’ll change shape and size with you, so you can wear it when you’re a blaster, too. It’s waterproof, should be hard to tear,” Thresh says, as though they already need to defend their work. They tap their talons together. Stars, are they  _ nervous?  _ “When it gets bigger, there’s slits in the back for your spines if you needa bristle them. Got a tie around the waist to keep it from hangin’ around your legs too much. Slits for them big ole wings, too. If you don’t like it, I can make modifications—”

“It’s wonderful, Thresh,” Gaster says, hugging the overcoat to his chest. Papyrus pokes his muzzle out, whuffing curiously at it. Stars, having this to wear might make him feel  _ normal  _ when he’s in his blaster form. (Well. Well maybe not quite that far, but it’s an improvement to be sure.) “Isn’t it wonderful, Paps? Do you see what Thresh made? They did a good job, didn’t they?”

“Oh, hush.” Thresh waves a hand at him, sniffing. “Suck-up. You are welcome.”

“I didn’t know we were bringing  _ presents!”  _ Ipera exclaims, distraught. “What do you want, Dr. Gaster? We’ll go get something right away.”

“No, no no, it’s really fine,” Gaster says, stumbling a step back and rubbing the back of his neck. “I don’t need presents.”

“Well, that’s a damn shame, ‘cause there’s a real line-up,” Mello says, materializing behind him with a wicked grin. Undyne is cradled against her chest, watching Gaster with two fierce little eyes. Paps grumbles when he sees her, ducking back into Gaster’s coat. “Got everybody linin’ up to love on you, huh?”

“Oh,  _ no,”  _ Gaster breathes, with nothing short of horror. Mello cackles, and his face feels warm. Stars, he must be glowing purple. 

The next hour is spent opening presents and cards he  ~~ does not deserve ~~ is incredibly grateful for. Fortunately, not  _ all  _ of the presents are for him. Some are for his boys—new toys and clothes, books and video games and movies. Papyrus latches onto the squeaky toy he’s offered and gnaws gleefully on it. Gaster’s brand-new overcoat squeaks raucously for the rest of the party. The dogs all watch him with rapt jealousy.

Dinner is nothing short of Grillby’s best. Tables are set up in the backyard, each with its own flaming lantern to warm the area around it. Lining the tables, Gaster finds bowls of risotto, plates of fresh fruit, bowls of salad, tiny bottles of every dressing under the sun, pots of warm poached pears, platters of apple galette and butterscotch pie and gooey brownies. Grillby whips out his old backyard grill and makes steaks for every damn monster in the yard, and they feast like kings. Even Papyrus dares to try a bite of the brownie, although he makes a disgruntled face as soon as he does and spends several minutes licking the flavor from his teeth.

“This,” Belous tells Gaster, licking the blood of her steak from her claws, “is  _ phenomenal.  _ You should switch jobs more often, if it’s gonna get Grillbz cooking like this.”

“I second that!” Ipera shouts, thrusting her fork victoriously at him. “Your turn-over rate needs to be high after this, Dr. Gaster.”

“Oh, dear. I hope not,” he says. 

“I’m sure it won’t be. We plan to keep you for quite some time,” a new voice says, and Gaster turns to see Dr. Boulger standing next to him, a warm smile on his face. “Do pardon my tardiness. Today is a bit busy for me, but I wanted to come and offer my congratulations.”

“Oh—oh, that’s very generous of you,” Gaster says, a shy smile flashing across his face as he peers up at one of his (many) new employers. “Thank you very much.”

“But of course.” Dr. Boulger extends a tentacle, and Gaster shakes it tentatively. “I look forward to working with you, Professor Gaster.”

The title sends a little jolt down his spine—one he hasn’t felt since he defended his dissertation, since his peers looked on him and called him  _ doctor.  _ His chest floods with warmth. He speaks amiably with Dr. Boulger for a few minutes longer, then gets his attention whisked away by a group of his—of  _ Alphys’ _ scientists. Alphys herself pulls him off to the side shortly after that, handing him a small card with a time and date on it. 

“H-here,” she says. “Asgore told me about your ethics committee, a-and I’m, um, I’m meeting with him and a f-few other monsters to discuss it later this week. We’d really like it if you could be there.”

“Ah.” He rubs the back of his neck. “If it’s at the lab, I really don’t—”

“No, n-no, not the lab. We’re having it at the palace. There’s going to be t-tea, and candy, and donuts probably—you know it’s not a meeting without  _ donuts.” _

He laughs. “Consider me well-bribed, Alphys. I’ll see if I can make it.”

(He’s going to make it. Anything.  _ Anything  _ to keep something like what happened to him, what happened to his  _ children,  _ from happening to anyone else in the world.)

Sans bounds up to him after dessert has been eaten, climbing into his lap and curling fingers into his coat. Papyrus snuffles in greeting. “Hello there, little one,” Gaster says. “Are you enjoying yourself?”

Sans nods, although there’s a little frown set on his face.

“Are you sure?” Gaster prompts. “If you’re not, it’s alright. Say the word and I’ll start clearing the house out.”

Sans shakes his head. “No, really, it’s good. I like seeing everyone. I just—blegh. I dunno.”

Gaster takes a token from his son’s book and waits, as patiently as he can, for Sans to continue. He rubs Sans’ spine gently as he does, keeping his face turned towards Sans to dissuade anyone else from trying to talk to him. Quiet he may be, but he’s still very much involved in a conversation, and he need not be distracted. 

“I just—I miss Toriel,” Sans admits, after a moment of silence. “I wish she was here.”

“Ah.” Gaster breathes out a regretful little sigh, leaning back against his seat. Sans leans back with him, curling up against his chest and draping an arm over the Papyrus-lump in his overcoat. 

“I know there’s nothing you can do about it, and she won’t come here, but—” Sans hitches a shoulder up in a half-hearted shrug. “I miss her.”

“Maybe we should call her.”

Sans offers him the barest sliver of a hopeful look. “You think she’ll answer?”

“Worth a shot, isn’t it?”

Gaster dials Toriel, and he holds his breath as the phone rings, and rings, and rings, and—“Wingdings? Whatever do you need, dear?”

“Toriel!” He beams, and he...probably said that too loudly, because he sees Asgore’s head whip around, his eyes wide. He clears his throat and quiets his voice to a more appropriate level. “Hi. Actually, I was just calling to catch up. Sans missed you, and—and so did I.”

Toriel sighs fondly. “Oh, little ones. Of course I’ve missed you too. How have you all been? Are you settling back in well?”

As they talk, Gaster stands and scoops Sans up, carrying him towards the bedroom. When they reach it, he sets Sans down and releases Papyrus, then sets the phone on the floor and puts it on speaker. The three of them talk with Toriel for several minutes, regaling her with their stories and the events of the rest Underground. She, in turn, tells them of life at Home. She tells them about the lives of her garden plants, the new recipes she’s trying, the growing chill in the air as the Surface leans into winter and sends blustering breezes through the Ruins.

It’s not enough by far, but it is as much as Gaster can offer his sons—and both of them seem delighted with it. As soon as Papyrus hears Toriel’s voice, he freezes, his eyes wide and rapt. His tail begins to wag, and he bounds around the phone, yapping in curiosity. Sans giggles and pulls him into a hug, and Gaster leans back on his hands and watches as his children speak to the woman who undoubtedly saved his life.

He has so very much to be grateful for. It’s almost overwhelming.

Asgore, as promised, clears everyone out of the house while Gaster is upstairs—everyone save one particular person. “Grillby wanted to speak with you before he left,” Asgore says, setting a paw on his shoulder once they finally slip out of the bedroom. The king’s eyes drift towards Gaster’s phone, and Gaster can see the questions in them, but Asgore remains mercifully silent. “He’s out on the porch.”

Gaster leaves his children in the living room, under their king’s watchful eye, and slips onto the porch. He folds his hands behind his back, breathing out a plume of chilled air. “By the stars, Grillby,” he says, coming to stand next his friend. “What a feast! How long did that take you?”

Grillby chuckles, warm and crackling.  _ Oh, it doesn’t matter. I’m only glad it made you all so happy. _

“Honestly, I don’t understand why you aren’t working at some bustling five-star restaurant in the capital. You’d be rich.”

_ What, and leave all of this behind?  _ Grillby tips his chin up, breathes in the crisp air.  _ This quiet little town? This familiarity, this peace? My bar? My friends? You? No, my dear. This is where I belong, and this is where I’m happy to stay. _

Gaster’s soul hums with delight, and a grin dances across his teeth. “Yeah?” He leans against the porch railing. “Me, too, actually. If things could stay like this forever, I think I’d be the happiest man alive.”

Grillby takes a deep breath, glancing in his direction. There’s an odd, nervous flicker to his flames—a yellow tint that isn’t ordinarily there. Gaster wrings his hands, then gives them a gentle shake to convince his foolish emotions they don’t need to copy Grillby’s. (It isn’t a very successful shake. His own nerves are already determined to be on edge, because if  _ Grillby  _ is worried, then obviously  _ Gaster  _ needs to be worried.)

_...Wings? I love you. _

“I know.” Gaster leans over, bumping Grillby’s shoulder affectionately with his own. “I love you too. Stars, I don’t know where I’d be without you. You’ve been a safe spot through all of this, and your advice has been invaluable to me. You’ve been far more patient with me than I deserve, and I can’t begin to express how grateful I am.”

Grillby exhales a curl of gray smoke, glancing away. His flames jitter uncomfortably. He lifts his hands, flickers them through a few awkward half-signs, then lets them fall again.

“Grillby?” Gaster leans towards him, brow furrowing. “Are you...okay?”

Grillby waves his hands helplessly. The yellow in his flames grows more prominent.

“Hey.” Gaster shuffles closer, then leans his weight against Grillby and feels the elemental straighten up to bear it. He rests his head against Grillby’s shoulder, and his soul twists in concern when he feels the shivers running through Grillby’s core. Through their magic, so closely entwined, he can feel the dim pulse of Grillby’s fear. Stars, his poor elemental’s nerves feel shot. (It’s so easy to forget, sometimes, that he and his children aren’t the only ones suffering because of what Jackson did—especially easy when some people are so good at hiding their suffering behind walls of strength and fury and flame.) “Hey, it’s okay. Don’t be scared.”

_ It’s hard not to be,  _ Grillby admits, his hands trembling as he signs. Gaster rests a hand on his back, rubbing in the same slow, steady circles he uses to calm his children from nightmares.  _ I’m afraid you’re going to be angry at me. _

“Angry?” Gaster blinks at him, baffled. “At  _ you?  _ Why in the world?”

_ Because I—oh, gods, I don’t know, Wings. It’s never made sense. I’ve always been so afraid to do this, and it just never seemed like the right time, and it  _ still  _ doesn’t, not really, but I’m beginning to wonder if there’s ever going to be a  _ right time  _ and—and maybe it’s just better to get it over with, you know?  _

A shiver of anxiety worms its way down Gaster’s spine. “Get what over with?”

_ I love you,  _ Grillby signs, fierce and intent—if only, Gaster thinks, to rid himself of his tremors.  _ Very much. I want to spend the rest of my life with you. _

“Okay, that’s nice, but what are you so worried about?”

Grillby drags his hands down his face, then whirls around to face Gaster.  _ Gods, I’m going to sound like a schoolgirl. I  _ like-like  _ you. I want to live with you, I want to wake up and make you breakfast, I want to drop our children off at school together and watch them grow, I want to teach you to cook new recipes, I want to dance in our kitchen, I want to learn about all of your work—although you’ll have to forgive me, I’m so unbearably slow when it comes to science. I want to watch you make lesson plans for your students, I want to be there on every birthday, I want to make sure you’re always warm enough, I want to hug you and I just want to be around you because you make my soul  _ happy,  _ Wings. _

Gaster stares.

_ And I!  _ Grillby continues with a desperate flail.  _ Understand if you don’t feel that way! And I understand if this is sudden and if it isn’t the right time. I know you’re busy with the boys, I know you’re stressed and struggling and they need all of your attention and if you don’t have time for this right now it’s perfectly fine I just—I had to tell you or I was afraid I never would.  _

Gaster...stares some more. His soul is beginning to do something warm and fuzzy. His face feels hot.

_ S-so,  _ Grillby says, his hands stumbling over the sign,  _ I love you. If you don’t love me that way, if you don’t want any of that—now or ever—it is absolutely okay. Just—just don’t be mad?  _ He shrinks into himself, his flames wilting. He looks very small and lost, suddenly, and nothing like the powerful, endlessly steady force Gaster knows him for.  _ I can tolerate rejection. I’m a grown man, not a child, and I won’t wallow about it, and I won’t ever act on these foolish feelings if you don’t want that. But I would be—I would be very sad to lose your friendship. _

“...are you sure?” Gaster asks. His voice sounds hoarse and unfortunately flat, but he simply can’t fathom what emotion he’s supposed to try to inflect it with yet.

_ Sure?  _ Grillby looks on him with disbelief.  _ Wings, I’ve been sure for  _ years.  _ Do you remember—heh, do you remember when you came to the bar that Halloween, a couple of decades after the Barrier was made? You were with Asgore, and you were dressed up like a devil, and I thought it was the funniest thing because you were so sweet and mild. You’d come by the bar before, of course, but that night Asgore went to talk to someone and left you alone and you were so unsure, like you didn’t know who to talk to or how to do it, even, and so I struck up a conversation with you, and I found out you liked your tea hot, two sugars no milk, and you liked history and so we talked about the war and I told you my stories and you seemed so  _ interested  _ and you told me you were a war orphan but you were making your way in the world and you worked at the royal labs and the Royal Scientist really took a shine to you and the reason you signed was because you couldn’t speak the way others would understand and you tried to explain your font to me but I never got it and to be honest I still don’t but that night, Wings, do you remember that night? _

“I—yes, I remember. I thought you were very sweet for entertaining me for so long. Stars, I must have been so awkward.”

_ You were! Oh, but Wings, that was the night I knew I wanted you in my life. I didn’t know quite  _ how,  _ back then, but I told Pyre about you and then she—ha! Then she interrogated you the next time you came by the bar, didn’t she? _

Gaster remembers that most vividly. Grillby’s wife had scared the shit out of him the first time he’d met her, all snapping blue flame and sharp-shot questions. But she had warmed to him quickly; they’d never been close friends, not like he and Grillby had rapidly become, but her loss still hurt him. (Not nearly as much as it hurt Grillby, though. There were times Gaster feared Grillby would fall from the wound her death dealt his soul; he didn’t, of course. He had Fuku to look after.) “God, don’t remind me. She hated me.”

_ Nonsense! She adored you, Gaster. In fact she—she teased me about having a crush, after a few years.  _ Grillby rubs the back of his neck sheepishly.  _ I think she would have been alright with it, you know? Elementals aren’t exactly monogamous, and she was quite fond of you. If we had only had more time, maybe we could have—all three of us, maybe— _

For a moment, Grillby’s flames dim with his grief—then he takes a deep breath and shakes himself off and continues.  _ All that to say, the more I got to know you the more I loved you and the more I hated it when you had to leave and now I’m so—I’m so scared when you leave. I know that’s not healthy, but after Jackson I just—and—and somewhere along the road I fell in love. I don’t know when or—or how, it’s not like it happened all at once, but I realized the strength of what I felt for you when you moved to Snowdin and I started seeing you every day and I realized  _ we could be a possibility.

“So this has—this has nothing to do with you giving me your magic?” He grinds his teeth nervously. “This isn’t some weird emotional backlash? There’s not...an ultimatum?”

_ God, no! I would never hold that over your head. If you don’t want this with me, you have only to say the word and I’ll never bring it up again—nor would I dream of taking my magic from you. You’re my responsibility, Wings. It doesn’t matter if you’re my— _ He waves his hands helplessly.  _ Boyfriend? Partner? Best friend? Enemy? Stranger? You can be whatever you want to me. I will never take my magic from you. Though there is a certain amount of emotional feedback from the magic link, it’s not enough to sway my own emotions, and I have loved you far longer than I have shared my soul with you. _

“Oh, Grillby.” Gaster cradles his own face in his hands, overwhelmed by the  _ everything  _ he’s feeling—he’s scared and he’s stunned and he’s delighted and he’s embarrassed and ashamed and uncertain and hopeful and and and and—

_ You can say no,  _ Grillby says hastily, as though that’s the most important part of their conversation. Perhaps, to him, it is.  _ I don’t want to force you into anything, I just wanted you to know. I can—I’ll take Fuku and go right now, if you want. No harm done. We’ll just forget it ever happened. _

“No, we won’t.” Gaster takes a deep breath, picking at the threads of his emotions until he  _ thinks  _ they resemble some kind of order. “Grillby, this is impossible to forget.”

Grillby cringes, hugging himself and flickering all kinds of bleak, fearful colors. Gaster’s soul twists at the sight—no matter what, Grillby is, above all else, his best friend. Nothing can change that. He reaches out, gripping the elbow of Grillby’s jacket and tugging him forward. Grillby stumbles an uncertain step in his direction.

“Come here,” Gaster says, opening his arms. “Come  _ here,  _ Grillby. You don’t need to be scared. You’re still my best friend. It’s going to take a lot more than one love confession to change  _ that.”  _

Grillby laughs, relief washing through his flames in flickers of pale blue and green. He folds into Gaster’s arms, and Gaster hugs him tightly.  _ Sorry,  _ Grillby signs.  _ I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to stress you out. _

“What doesn’t stress me out, at this point?” Gaster asks, wry. “It’s not your fault I have the emotional stability of a pickle.”

Grillby chuckles against him, although the sound is weak and shaky. 

“I love you,” Gaster says, starting with the things he knows for sure. “I want you to stay in my life. You make me happy too, Grillbz. Stars, of course you do. You’ve been so good for me, and for the boys. You’re a wonderful monster, and I could hardly be angry with you for this.”

As he speaks, signing in Grillby’s sight with a pair of manifested hands, he feels Grillby relax in his arms, leaning more heavily against him.

“I have to admit, I’ve not—I’ve not thought of something like that with you,” he admits. (Okay, it’s—only  _ partially  _ a lie. He’s considered it a few times, but certainly not as much as it seems Grillby has.) He expects to feel Grillby wilt, but the elemental doesn’t move, nor does the color of his flame shift. He stands, and he waits with endless patience for Gaster to continue. “Not because you’re unappealing by any means, but I rarely think of things like that.” 

Then he remembers Grillby’s hands on his, teaching him to knead bread, and he remembers the heat in his face and the pleasant twist in his soul. Maybe he’s had more of a crush than he thought. His cheeks begin to warm.

“I haven’t been in a relationship since I was very young—since before I was the Royal Scientist,” he continues, carding his fingers gently through the flames along the crest of Grillby’s head. “Those things were too time-consuming for me, and I loved my work far more than I could love another person. At least, that’s what I thought. Then Sans came along.”

_ They’ve made you better,  _ Grillby says, face buried against the crook of Gaster’s neck, signing along with a pair of clumsily-shaped fire hands.  _ Those boys. They’ve made you softer. _

“And that’s a good thing?”

“Mm-hm.” Grillby nods. 

“You’re probably right.” Gaster leans their heads together, sighing wistfully. “Ever since Sans came around, things have been better. I feel more. I work less. Stars, a decade ago something like that would have terrified me, but—there are scarier things in the world, I think. Work doesn’t matter as much as people do. So I suppose I could try a relationship again, but Grillbz, you’re  _ important  _ to me. I don’t want to mess this up.”

_ You couldn’t possibly. You’re perfect. _

“Now we both know that’s far from the truth.”

Grillby grumbles disconsolately against his vertebrae.

“What I’m saying is—I’m happy the way things are. Maybe I would be happier if we gave each other more of ourselves, but maybe things would be worse. Maybe we wouldn’t get along anymore. Maybe you’d fall out of love. Maybe I’d find out a relationship really isn’t for me. I just don’t want us to hate each other after all that.”

_ I could never ever hate you. _

“And I could never ever hate you.”

_ So it’s not a problem,  _ Grillby says, simply.  _ There. Next. _

Gaster laughs. Is it really that simple? ...maybe, this once, it is. “Okay, okay. I’m also not sure I’d be able to give you the time and attention you deserve.”

_ I’m low-maintenance. _

“I don’t  _ want  _ you to be low-maintenance. You deserve to be treated well, Grillby, not like some—some trophy boyfriend. You deserve someone who can shower you with attention, and give you everything good, and take care of you when  _ you  _ can’t take care of you. I’m—” He rubs his skull. “We both know that right now I’m pretty shit, emotionally and mentally. I’m working on it, but I’m a goddamn mess, and I don’t want to drag you down.”

_ I know you’re hurt, Wings, very badly. I have watched you suffer. This is nothing new to me, and if it was going to influence how I felt about you, it would have done so long before now. I’m yours, through thick and thin. You aren’t going to frighten me off. _

“No, but—I can be mean, and angry, and hateful, and I don’t want that for you, not ever. Maybe it’s better that you keep your distance until I’m more stable.”

Grillby shakes his head.  _ No. I’m not going to leave you to struggle through this alone. What? You think I’m some sort of fair-weather friend? _

Gaster snorts. “I think you’re a fool to put yourself through this.”

_ Wingdings.  _ Grillby leans back, taking Gaster’s hands in his own.  _ Yes, this will be difficult. Yes, there will be bad days—but I am sure there will be more good than bad. Not once in all the years I’ve known you has there been more bad than good, else I would have left you long ago. I’m no martyr. I can stand up for myself, and I’ll damn well tell you if you’re bothering me, and we’ll deal with it like adults.  _

“...you promise?”

_ I promise. _

Gaster exhales softly, then breathes in again. He smells smoke. He smells home. “There’s also the issue of the boys, of course. They need so much of my attention, Grillby. I don’t know if I’ll be able to split it between you and them. I  _ have  _ to be there for them. I don’t want you to feel as though you come second to them, but…”

_ Fear not, I know my place,  _ Grillby says, a smile flickering across his face.  _ They’re your priority right now. I understand that, and I won’t ask for anything different. I—actually, I already spoke with Sans about this, if it makes a difference. He gave me his blessing. _

“He  _ what?”  _ Gaster says, his voice a tad shriller than he means it to be. 

Grillby laughs, sparking merrily.  _ He was the one who brought it up! He’s keen, that one. Evidently, I haven’t been hiding my crush as well as I intended to. _

“You fooled me.”

_ Yes, well, your emotional interpretation is… _

“Not the best, I know, I know. I’m not surprised Sans picked up on it before I did. He did the same with Jackson.”

Grillby winces.

“Not to compare you to Jackson! Oh, jeez, I’m sorry. That was stupid.”

_ It’s alright. For what it’s worth, Sans said he wouldn’t mind sharing you. I’m not sure he fully understands what our relationship would mean for him, but he seems willing to tolerate me.  _

“Well, that’s certainly a step in the right direction.” Gaster cups a hand against the back of his neck, feels out the thin scar there. “I—stars, I don’t know, Grillby. I think I want to, but I’m—frightened, I suppose. Heh. What’s new? You’re incredible, and I don’t doubt you’d make me very happy, but I need time. Whatever we do, it will be slow. I don’t want to hold you back.”

_ Wings, I’ve waited almost a hundred years for this. If you want to wait a few more, we will. If you want to move as slowly as a glacier, we will. I’m no spring chicken, so you—  _

Gaster snorts. “Spring chicken?”

_ You know? It’s metaphor?  _ Grillby rolls his eyes fondly, ruffling a hand over Gaster’s skull. 

“No, no, I was just imagining you as a chicken.”

_Of course you were, silly. What I mean_ _is that I’m an old man, and I’ve no need to rush through life. You set the pace. I’ll follow along. I’m very good at that._

Gaster reaches up, taking Grillby’s chin gently between his fingers. Grillby blinks at him. “Following along? You? Since when?”

_ Since I joined the war. I haven’t done it for any commanders, not in a very long time, but for you—for you, I would. _

“Commander Gaster.” Gaster grimaces. “Ick, no.”

_...no, I don’t like it, either. _

“I didn’t imagine you would. No, Grillby. I don’t want you to do everything I want. This relationship thing is supposed to be about compromise, right? About making each other happy? Let’s do that. We’ll find a pace together.”

A warm shiver of green pulses through Grillby’s flames.  _ We will? Is that a yes? _

“It’s a soft yes.” A smile flickers across Gaster’s face. “I’m willing to try, as long as you promise we’ll still be best friends, no matter what.”

_ Always,  _ Grillby breathes, sparking in delight.  _ So can I—does that mean—can I kiss you? _

“No,” Gaster says, his eyes twinkling mischievously. He leans forward, pressing his teeth to Grillby’s cheek and savoring the way Grillby practically  _ glows  _ pink for him. “My turn first.”

Grillby wraps his arms around Gaster, picking him up and spinning him around and giggling—a bright, happy sound that makes him seem a thousand years younger. Giddiness feels like a warm light behind Gaster’s sternum. He is warm and loved and bright, and he remembers again that things are going to be okay—that things might even be, perhaps, better than they ever have been, if he only has the will to make them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: this chapter was edited while listening Exclusively to "shia labeouf" live by rob cantor for like two hours straight and that was the best decision ive ever made


	34. despite everything, it’s still him

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warnings: symptoms of ptsd (including a pretty vivid flashback), panic attack
> 
> “I put Algernon's body in a cheese box and buried him in the backyard. I cried.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

Gaster stacks a pile of leftover syllabi neatly on his desk, then tucks them into a manilla folder that quickly finds its way into his file cabinet. His first lecture had, he thinks, gone remarkably well, all things considered. His anxiety had only  _ nearly  _ driven him up a wall beforehand, but once he stepped into the classroom and started speaking, he fell into a familiar rhythm. It’s not entirely different from going over a procedure with new lab assistants, or answering an intern’s questions, or explaining his Core mechanics to another physicist. Of course, he has to slow things down quite a bit for these new students, but he’s gotten better at doing that since he’s had Sans. 

The students had been suitably impressed, of course. His reputation proceeded him— “the Royal Scientist,” they had whispered, “a weapon of his own making, he turns into a dragon, he’s  _ boyfriends  _ with a war elemental, he saw the Surface, he made the whole Core, he  _ cloned himself—” _

The first half of the class was, as a result, an impromptu Q and A about his life. 

Yes, he had been the Royal Scientist, but no longer. No, he hadn’t been fired, he’d resigned. 

_ Why? _ He needed a job that allowed him more time with his boys. 

_ He had children?  _ Yes, as a matter of fact he did—two of them, the lights of his life, his pride and joy, his very best work. 

_ Weren’t they his kind-of clones? _ Yes. Yes they were. 

_ But how? _ A long story, for someone with more time on their hands than a sophomore sitting in a college physics lecture.

_ Hadn’t he been kidnapped and turned into a dragon? _ No, he’d been kidnapped and turned into a half-dragon. The other half is blaster. 

_ What’s a blaster? _ Here, I’ll show you. Please don’t touch it, it’s easily agitated. 

_ Woah my god Dr. Gaster that’s so cool can you— _ no, he won’t do it again. 

And yes. Yes, he is boyfriends with the fire elemental in Snowdin.

By the time they actually get to the class rules and expectations, Gaster is—well, not relaxed, but certainly less tense. These are  _ children.  _ (Well, young adults, most, but to someone as old as he is they feel like toddlers.) They’re young and naive and brutally hopeful and so, so impressionable. He can only hope to impress on them, above all else, the ethics of science and study. They don’t discuss any actual physics, but that’s alright. He has an entire semester to do that, and his lesson plan is solid. The algebra and trigonometry professors had kindly gone over it with him, as had Dean Boulger, and they had all pronounced it quite manageable.

Gaster stands and stretches, popping his spine and groaning. This office chair isn’t quite as tolerable as the one he left at the lab; he may have to replace it soon. He snags his binder and textbook—he’ll need to review for the physics lab tomorrow—and crams them into his carrier bag before hooking it over his shoulder and glancing at the clock. Stars, is it noon already? Being grilled to within an inch of his life by enthusiastic sophomores really makes time fly.

As he steps towards the door, his phone chimes merrily at him. He fishes it out of his pocket, glancing at the text—it seems to be an automatic page from the school’s system.  _ Dr. Gaster, please report to the McKibbin Nursery at your earliest convenience. _

Huh. That doesn’t seem good—but they didn’t call him, so he assumes (please dear god) that it’s not an emergency. Even so, he hustles his way towards the nursery, flashing nervous smiles at all the students and faculty he passes in the hallway. He practically skids to a stop in front of the nursery check-in, his eyes wide. “Hi,” he says to the receptionist, fumbling to sign quickly but neatly. “I’m Dr. Gaster. Sans and Papyrus are my children. I got a text to come here…?”

“Oh, of course,” the receptionist chirps merrily. He unlocks the door, ushering Gaster into the office and leading him down the daycare hallway. “Come right in. It’s nothing bad, but Mrs. Pearcy had a quick question about Papyrus. Here, right down this way.”

The receptionist leads him to the infant nursery, opening the door and motioning him inside. The nursery is a wide, spacious room with thick carpets and playmats and all kinds of soft-fuzzy-happy posters on the walls. Cribs line the far wall, and rocking chairs are sprinkled in strategic locations throughout the area. Brightly-colored baby toys litter the floor, although there aren’t quite as many toys here as there are in Sans’ daycare room, seeing as infants tend to sleep more often than they play with or chew on things—the same cannot be said for four- and five-year-olds. 

“Mrs. Pearcy? Here’s Dr. Gaster, for Papyrus,” the receptionist says, handing him off to a sturdy-looking goblin holding a baby bottle. 

“Hullo there, Gaster,” Mrs. Pearcy says. “A quick question about your lad. He was doing just fine this morning—fine for him, at least, hiding under the crib and chewing my teething rings into pieces—but he got a little stressed earlier. He kept looking for you, I should think, clawing up my door. I didn’t figure he could get out, being as he only has those little paws, but he sure fooled me! You know, it would have been nice to know that he could shapeshift. Kind of an important detail, don’t you think?”

“He can  _ what.” _

“Shapeshift?” Mrs. Pearcy arches her gnarly eyebrows, then gestures towards a far crib. Gaster wavers on his feet. Oh, dear. Oh,  _ dear.  _ Then there’s a rough little hand on his shoulder, patting gently. “There, now, what’s the matter? Don’t tell me this is his first time!”

Gaster nods vaguely. Oh god oh god oh god his son can  _ shapeshift.  _ Well—well he knew that would probably happen, but it always seemed like such a distant idea. He’d barely thought about it, recently. What a damned mistake that was. His son shapeshifted, and he  _ missed it!  _

“Well, whatever are you standing here for? Go take a look!” Mrs. Pearcy crows, more or less shoving him towards the crib. “Congratulations, professor.”

Gaster stumbles to the crib, peering over the railing and—oh. There he is. Papyrus. Gaster’s soul melts a little bit more inside of his chest, warm and fuzzy. Papyrus’ hominid forms looks as fit as a fiddle, save for the shaved-down spinous processes just above his shoulders. He has ten tiny fingers and ten tiny toes, all blunt and harmless. He looks  _ nothing  _ like Sans. His skull is square and angular where Sans’ is round, his ribs and shoulders are narrow and thin where Sans is wide and chunky, and his eyesockets are shallow and tall. Stars, he’s  _ perfect. _

“Hey, Papyrus,” Gaster whispers, leaning his arms against the crib railing and studying his son as intently as he’s ever studied anything. “Look at you, baby boy. You know who you look like? You look like your aunt Lora did, when she was a baby.”

(He remembers Lora, vaguely. She’d been born a few years after him, just before the war took everything. He had sat in his mother’s lap while she rocked Lora, and he’d studied her tiny soft bones and resigned himself to sharing Consolas’ attention with yet another child.)

Papyrus stirs briefly, rolling over and sliding his thumb into his mouth. Gaster’s soul wallows in helpless affection, and he can’t quite stop cooing inside of his own head. His one saving grace is that he manages not to coo aloud. He still has  _ some  _ dignity to maintain, after all.

“So?” Mrs. Pearcy asks, grinning at him. She has a new infant cradled in her arms—a tiny owl, Gaster realizes. It blinks bright yellow eyes open to study him, and he glances quickly away. “Is he as cute as you imagined?”

“Even cuter.”

“Which parent does he take after?”

“Oh, me, definitely. He looks quite a bit like my little sister did, when she was a baby. Hey, would it be alright if I brought Sans in to show him?”

“I don’t see why not.”

Gaster practically bolts to Sans’ daycare room, flapping his hands in giddy excitement. “Sans!” he says, laughing and scooping his son into his arms as soon as the attendants let him into the room. Sans giggles and wraps his arms around Gaster’s neck, nuzzling him into him. “Afternoon, kiddo. How are you?”

“I’m good! What’s got you in such a happy mood? First day of class went that great, huh?” Sans asks, grinning.

“No—well, yes, but I’ve something exciting to show you. Here, close your eyes.”

Sans arches his eyebrows but does, after a moment’s hesitation, close his eyes. Gaster carries him into the nursery, propping him on his hip as they stand next to Papyrus’ crib. “Can I look now?” Sans asks, squirming.

“Yeah, you can look now.”

Sans’ eyes spring open, and then he freezes. His mouth drops open. “Oh my god.”

“Right?”

“Oh my  _ god  _ he’s so tiny.”

_ “Right?” _

“He’s so cute I’m gonna die.”

_ “Right?!” _

Mrs. Pearcy sets a hand on Gaster’s shoulder again. “Now, now, I know you’re excited, but do mind your volume.”

Gaster struggles to mind his volume, and he and Sans whisper enthusiastically over Papyrus’ crib. Even so, Papyrus begins to stir, squinting his eyes open to glare at them both. “Sorry,” Sans whispers, although there’s a wide grin on his face. “Did we wake you up?”

Papyrus clicks his teeth, his face softening as soon as he recognizes his big brother. He reaches up, and Gaster sets Sans down and scoops Papyrus out of the crib. He kneels to Sans’ level, and Sans reaches out a little hand. Papyrus curls his fingers firmly around Sans’ wrist and garbles something incomprehensible. 

“Yeah? Is that right?” Sans asks, giggling. “Good to know, bro.”

Gaster takes about nine thousand pictures of Papyrus, sending them to his friends with several heart emojis and stars and exclamation points. The basic gist of each text is this: look!!! look at my  _ son look how cute he is look!!! _

Eventually, he has to stop freaking out because his children are hungry. He props Papyrus on his hip  _ because he can do that now  _ and holds Sans’ hand, heading for the dining hall. Sans listens intently as Gaster points out his coworkers and the handful of physics students they pass in the hallways—his concentration is only broken once they sit down with their food. They chow down on orange chicken and rice with vegetables, and Papyrus sits in Gaster’s lap and squints suspiciously at everything around them. 

“Whatcha think, Pappy?” Gaster asks quietly, setting a hand on his son’s skull. “Not so bad, is it?”

“Dr. Gaster!” an unfortunately loud voice says, and Papyrus jumps and growls. Gaster tightens his grip ever-so-slightly. “How’s your first day going?”

“It’s good,” Gaster says, as mildly as he can after being so startled, and Dr. Boulger takes a seat next to him. 

“I’m glad to hear it—oh, is this Papyrus? He looks even more like you, now.” Dr. Boulger peers curiously at Papyrus, but keeps his distance. Even so, Papyrus breathes quickly, one tiny fist balling into Gaster’s button-up. “And Sans! How’s the daycare, buddy?”

“It’s good,” Sans says, looking nervously at Gaster. “There are a lot of toys.”

“That there are, that there are. Now, about your lecture this morning, Professor, I heard you had quite the storytime…”

Gaster speaks as politely as he can with Dr. Boulger, bouncing Papyrus gently on his knee, and he makes his escape as soon as he’s finished eating. All three of them breathe a collective sigh of relief once they’re out of the dining hall. 

“Jeez,” Sans says. “Socializing, huh?”

“I thought you enjoyed it.”

“I thought I did too. It’s just—” He rubs the back of his neck, frowning. “I dunno. Everything’s so new. I wanna go back home.”

“Soon, sweetheart, I promise. Just a few more hours. Think you can handle it?”

“Yeah. It’s not awful, it’s just weird.”

Gaster leaves him in the daycare with a few more words of encouragement, then goes to drop Papyrus off. Leaving Papyrus is significantly more difficult than leaving Sans. Papyrus  _ clings,  _ and he cringes when Mrs. Pearcy tries to hold him. It breaks Gaster’s soul to see him so scared, and it takes no small amount of perseverance to get himself to leave the nursery once he’s pried Papyrus off of himself. It’s for his own good, he tries to think. It’s for his own good, for everyone’s good. (But isn’t that what Jackson thought, too…?)

He sits with his head in his hands until his next lecture begins, and then he forces himself up and into the classroom. 

That evening, he gets home and collapses onto the couch with a groan. Sans and Papyrus both climb into his lap, and the three of them sit and watch Blue’s Clues. He doesn’t think it’s normal, the way his children stick so closely to him. They should running around the house, bounding up and down the stairs, playing with their toys and begging to go outside. Instead, they sit and they lean against him. Their therapist has assured him that’s to be expected, but he hopes desperately they’ll begin branching out once things settle into their new normal and they realize they’re safe.

...he hopes, and he dreads. (How is he going to keep them safe, if they start branching out? How is he going to know where they are, who they’re with, where they’re going? How is he going to—no. No, that’s enough. Something to worry about later.)

Speaking of therapy, though, that’s...something he should probably start getting ready for. Dr. Willow won’t be pleased if he’s late. Reluctantly, he shifts his children off of his lap and begins pulling on his new overcoat and boots. Right on cue, there’s a knock at the door, and Gaster opens the door with a flick of blue magic and ushers Grillby inside.

“Good evening,” he says, hopping on one foot as he hastily tugs his other boot. “How was—”

_ Papyrus shifted! _

“Oh—ha ha, yes, he did. Would you like to take a look?”

Grillby bolts past him as soon as he’s been given permission, crackling enthusiastically. He speaks briefly with Sans, bending over the back of the couch to greet Papyrus, who babbles uncertainly at him. Gaster finishes buttoning his coat, then leans against the doorframe, watching his little family fondly. 

“Has he never shifted shapes before?” a smooth voice asks next to him, and he nearly jumps through the wall. He clutches his sternum, glancing down as Fuku steps into the house, stamping snow off of her boots. She blinks at up at him, bemused. “I mean, Sans has been doing that for forever.”

“W-well—well, yes,” Gaster admits, hauling in a deep breath and forcing himself to relax. “This was Papyrus’ first time. You can go take a look, if you want.”

_ Yes, Fuku, come here. Look!  _ Grillby scoops Papyrus up, cradling him against his chest. Papyrus looks unamused, but he doesn’t try to squirm away.  _ Isn’t he adorable? Yes he is, yes he iiiiis—you know who you look like, scamp? You look like your daddy! _

“Does he?” Gaster asks, arching a bonebrow.

_ He certainly does. He’s got your nose. _

“Huh.” 

_ It’s a cute nose.  _ Grillby saunters back to Gaster, leaning forward to kiss his nose. 

Laughing, Gaster sees Fuku and Sans trade a disgusted look, and then both of them decisively say, “Ew.”

_ Oh, come now. All of you have cute noses! Yes, even you, little miss— _ Grillby swoops down, kissing Fuku’s nose. She squeals and bats him away, giggling.  _ Now, who’s ready for dinner? What are we making tonight? _

“Pasta!” Sans crows, already making a beeline for the kitchen. 

“No, pie,” Fuku protests, trotting after him. The two of them pause, then amend, “Pasta pie!”

Grillby chuckles, nudging Gaster affectionately.  _ Well, I’m off to make pasta pie. Have fun with Dr. Willow. _

“Oh, always,” Gaster says, wry. Then he tries to soften himself, leaning his temple against Grillby’s for a moment. “Thanks for watching them again. I know they like having someone familiar around.”

_ It’s no problem at all. I’ll see you tonight, okay? Be good. _

Gaster flashes him a fond smile, then slips outside and heads towards Dr. Willow’s—he’s got a lot of work to do, after all.

* * *

Sans chows down on a plate full of pasta pie. Papyrus sits in his lap and, when Sans offers him a forkful of gooey greatness, plucks a single noodle from it before cramming it into his mouth. He hums thoughtfully. “Good?” Sans asks. In response, Papyrus reaches for another noodle. As Papyrus finishes that noodle off, Sans seizes the chance to down another mouthful himself—and then he winces, because something in his mouth pulls and stings. When he bites down again, he feels something hard between his teeth. Um.  _ Um.  _

He glances up—Grillby is pouring himself a drink, so his back is turned, thank the stars. Fuku is watching. Carefully, once his magic has dissolved the noodles, Sans reaches into his mouth and plucks out whatever he’s caught between his teeth. It’s small and white and square and  _ oh my god that’s his loose tooth. _

Fuku gapes. “Woah—is that your  _ tooth?” _

“Yeah,” Sans says, his eyes wide. He stares at it, at this little piece of himself, rapt. Then his tooth dissolves into a puff of dust. It settles against his fingers, and his chest twists painfully. That reminds him of—of—

He lurches to his feet, wiping his hands against his pants. Oh, gross gross gross  _ gross.  _ That is disgusting, that is awful, that is—oh, that is the worst. He  _ hates  _ how his dust feels. It clings to his bones, worms its way into his joints, and he grimaces and heads for the sink. He sticks his hands under the water, blasting it as hot as it will go. Beside him, Grillby arches an eyebrow. 

_ Little one? What are you doing? _

_ Washing my hands. _

_ Whatever for? _

_ Nothing. _

Fuku appears on Grillby’s other side, tugging his sleeve.  _ Sans lost his tooth! _

_ Goodness did you? Let me see.  _ Grillby kneels, and Sans shakes water off of his hands and leans away. He can’t exactly  _ hide  _ the new gap in his smile, and he’s not sure why he wants to, but having their eyes on him, sharp and searching, it makes him feel...weird, like he can’t quite catch his breath.  _ Did it hurt? _

...it hurt when he lost his tail. 

God, he doesn’t want to think about that. He shakes his head, stumbling a step backwards. “No. It’s fine.”

It is, for some nonsensical reason, absolutely not fine. His mind grates over the feeling of his own dust, the feeling of his body being removed from itself. The whirr of a bonesaw begins to play on a loop in the back of his mind, fills his skull until his teeth ache. When Grillby’s hand touches his shoulder, he recalls what it felt like to be pinned down and held in place and  _ hurt,  _ and he flinches hard. Grillby jerks back.

_ Sans? What’s wrong, little one? _

“I don’t know,” Sans says. He still can’t catch his breath. Why can’t he catch his breath? “I d-don’t—I don’t know?”

He truly, honestly doesn’t. This isn’t like a nightmare, where he wakes up and realizes he’s safe and burrows against Dad until everything feels better. This isn’t like a memory, troubling but mercifully distant. This is something new, something big, something  _ worse,  _ and he suddenly feels very small and very out of control. 

His head is so  _ loud.  _ He registers, distantly, that someone is speaking to him—but he can’t make out the words over the sound of the bonesaw. He clamps his hands over his ears and slides to the ground, pressing his back against the wall and gulping for breath. When he looks up, he sees wide yellow eyes and tawny feathers and gleaming silver. His bones rattle in terror, and a petrified whimper strangles through his throat. Shadows lurk at the edges of his vision, and he flinches away from them and squeezes his eyes shut. 

_ Dad. He wants his daddy. _

He’s said that before, hasn’t he…? 

Jackson laughs. “You’re not gonna see your daddy ever again, kiddo,” he says, and his eyes take up the entire world, unholy gold. “You’d better start getting used to that.”

_ He wants his dad! He wants his dad he wants his dad he wants his dad  _ right now—!

Something tries to crawl into his arms, and cries out in terror and shoves it away. It tries again, and this time, he recognizes the texture of bone beneath his fingers. That, at least, feels safe, feels  _ familiar,  _ feels like Dad holding him close and whispering gentle words. The room around him swelters with heat, and that’s...wrong, isn’t it? It hadn’t been hot in Jackson’s lab. It had never been hot. It had always been cold, sterile rooms and cold, sterile tools and cold, sterile gloves touching him. 

When he dares to open his eyes a sliver, he sees who he’s holding. Papyrus burrows against his chest, tiny fingers curled into his shirt. He whimpers softly, his own bones rattling in fear, and Sans clutches him more tightly. The light around him is warm, tinted in greens and oranges and not the awful white fluorescents of the lab. He takes a deep, shuddering breath and feels tears drip between his teeth. 

“...back, Sans,” a low, quiet voice murmurs to him. “You’ll be okay. You’re safe here. It’s only a flashback. Whatever you’re thinking about, it’s over now, and it’s not happening again. You’re at home in Snowdin, with Papyrus and Fuku and me. You aren’t going to be hurt.” Then, more quietly, an aside, “Fuku, would you run and grab me a blanket? A glass of water, too, please.”

God, his head hurts. He brings a hand up and digs his fingers into his skull, hiccuping around a sob. Where is his dad? Why isn’t Dad here? Does Jackson have him? Is he being hurt? Oh, no no no no no—

“Sans, breathe, buddy. You’re safe. This is only a flashback. Can you tell me what you’re seeing? What are you looking at?”

His vision is fractured, blurry through his tears, the depth of the world hazy and unfocused. He sees light. He sees Papyrus. He sees—he sees a flash of yellow, and he quails again, squeezing his eyesockets shut. 

“Alright, sweetheart, that’s alright. We’ll try again in a minute. You remember where you are? You’re at home, in Snowdin. I’m Grillby, and Fuku and Papyrus are also here.”

But where is  _ Dad? _

“D-dad,” he says, his teeth chattering. “Wh-here’s Daddy?”

“Your dad is at Dr. Willow’s. He’s perfectly fine, and he’ll be back soon. He’s safe, just like you. No one is hurting him.”

Is that true? ...it  _ seems  _ like it might be true. Hesitantly, he cracks an eye open again. A warm, concerned orange face peers back at him. 

“Hey, bud, there you are. Can you see me?”

Sans nods warily.

“Good, that’s great. What else can you see?”

He flicks his eyes nervously around the room—he sees shadows that shouldn’t be there, flickers of gleaming metal that make his soul churn. He also sees the kitchen. He sees the legs of their table, the checkered tile, the oven, the fridge. 

“Sans,” Grillby coaxes. “Tell me what you see.”

Sans whispers, “Kitchen. Table, oven, floor, fridge.”

“Awesome, that’s right. We’re in the kitchen. Do you think you can watch if I sign?”

Sans nods, trying desperately to focus on the flickers of Grillby’s hands as he speaks. If he only looks at that, he thinks he can ignore the shadows crawling and crackling at the edges of the world. 

_ Tell me if I go too fast. I know it can be hard to focus. We’re gonna try smell, now. What can you smell? _

He’s breathing too quickly to smell much of anything, he thinks. His chest hitches with each breath, and he has to consciously slow it. “Smoke,” he says, his voice cracked and raw, “and the—the p-pasta.”

_ Very well done. You’re doing such a good job, Sans. _

Fuku steps back into the kitchen, moving slowly and carefully—as though she’s tread around something like this before. She hands Grillby a blanket.  _ Here,  _ she says, setting a hand on Grillby’s shoulder as he unfolds the blanket.  _ Need anything else? _

_ No, sweetpea, but thank you. _

_ Do I need to call Gaster? _

Grillby hesitates, glancing at the clock.  _ No. He’ll be back soon enough on his own. Besides, I think Sans is coming down from it. We’ll be alright. Isn’t that right, Sans? _

Sans swipes a hand across his eyes, sniffling. 

A pained expression flashes across Grillby’s face before he continues,  _ We’re gonna try hearing now. What can you hear, little one? _

Tentatively, Sans tries to listen—he half-expects to hear the whirr of the bonesaw again, but that seems to have faded. Instead, there’s a dim ringing in his ears. He supposes that has more to do with his hyperventilation than anything else. “Papyrus,” he says, a frown flickering across his face as he realizes his baby brother is still whimpering. He smooths a hand gently across Papyrus’ skull, and his soul twists when Papyrus flinches. 

_ What else?  _ Grillby prompts.  _ Listen. _

“You and Fuku. The wind outside.”

_ I’m going to assume you’re correct.  _ Grillby makes a half-hearted attempt at a grin.  _ I wouldn’t know otherwise. _

Sans would usually try to at least  _ chuckle— _ a joke is an offering of goodwill, after all, even if it’s a bad joke. Right now, he just doesn’t have the energy to appreciate it. Fear still curls through his bones, and he can’t quite stop shaking. His eyesockets sting with the threat of tears, although he tries valiantly to fight them back. He’s not a  _ baby.  _

_ Here.  _ Grillby holds the blanket towards him.  _ Would you like this? _

Sans takes the blanket and wraps it carefully around Papyrus, who looks miserably at him. “Lo,” Papyrus says, and a smile wobbles across Sans’ face.

_ Dad?  _ Fuku signs, setting a hand on Grillby’s shoulder again.  _ I’ll be in the living room. Shout if you need me. _

_ I will. Thank you very much for your help, darling. _

As Fuku slips out of the room, Grillby moves to sit next to Sans, leaning back against the wall. He hesitates for a moment, then opens his arms.  _ Want a hug? _

Sans crawls into his lap, leaning back against his chest and keeping Papyrus bundled close. Grillby’s arms close around them both, but they stay (thank god) loose and unrestricting. He rests his head against Grillby’s collarbone, taking a shaky breath. “Sorry,” he says. “I don’t know why I did, um. Any of that.”

_ It’s alright. Don’t apologize. That was a flashback. Was it your first one? _

A shudder rolls down Sans’ spine. A first implies a second. “There’re gonna be more?”

_ Hopefully not,  _ Grillby says.  _ But it’s a possibility, yes. They’re very scary, but you’re going to be okay. Your therapist can help you avoid them or work through them, so it won’t be so bad, next time. _

Sans whines.

_ I know, I know,  _ Grillby soothes.

“I don’t want it to happen again,” Sans says, swiping at his eyes before his tears can start to fall again. “I hate it.”

_ Yes, it’s awful, and I’m sorry you have to go through it. But you’re going to be okay, you hear me? You’re strong enough to get through this. Now, once your father gets home and we’ve spoken with him, we can— _

“No,” Sans says, fear racketing through him again. He curls his fingers into Grillby’s button-up, shaking his head fervently. “We can’t tell Dad.”

Grillby stares at him.

“Promise. Promise you won’t tell him,” Sans insists.

_ I will do no such thing. _

“Grillby!”

_ We can’t just  _ not  _ tell him about this, Sans. He is responsible for your care and wellbeing, and if you’re having flashbacks, he needs to be prepared to help you. _

“No he doesn’t. He’s got enough to worry about, you know he does! If he starts worrying about me he’ll just get sicker again. If you cared about him at all you wouldn’t tell him.”

Grillby pinches the bridge of his nose.  _ You come by your stubbornness honestly, at least. This isn’t up for debate, Sans. Your father  _ wants  _ to help you. He’s going to worry about you no matter what, the same way he has since you were created. It’s what he  _ does  _ as a parent, and he’s well-equipped to handle it. He’ll feel worse if you have a flashback he isn’t prepared for.  _

“Then I won’t  _ have  _ any more flashbacks,” Sans says, folding his arms across his chest. 

_ That isn’t something you can control. Could you have stopped this one if you wanted to? _

Sans hesitates.

_ Exactly. Perhaps, once you’ve learned some coping techniques, you’ll be able to ward one off—but I doubt you could do that right now.  _ Grillby exhales a quiet breath of smoke, rubbing Sans’ back briskly.  _ You need to stop hiding your hurts from your father, little one. Let him love you. Let him help you. You’ll find it isn’t as scary as you think. _

Guilt curdles against Sans’ soul, and he barely resists the urge to rub his sternum. Familiar advice, that. Familiar and just as bitter as it was when Dr. Yeoman said it. “I don’t want to hurt him anymore.”

_ Anymore? You’ve not hurt him at all. _

“I have,” Sans says, hunching his shoulders and tugging at the drawstrings of his hoodie. “It’s my fault he went to Jackson’s in the first place. It’s my fault I got kidnapped and he came looking for me and Jackson hurt him. It’s my fault he’s going to  _ die,  _ because I’m taking all of his magic. It’s all my  _ fault,  _ Grillbz, don’t you get it? And I can’t hurt him anymore than I already have. I won’t.”

Grillby flickers deep blue at the edges—that’s not a color Sans has seen before, and he studies it with no small amount of trepidation. The elemental takes a deep breath, then stands, scooping Sans and Papyrus up with him. He sets Sans down on the counter, snags a washcloth and runs half of it under warm water, then hands it to him.  _ Here,  _ he says.  _ Clean your face. _

Sans wipes the tears from his face, trying to breathe steadily through the sudden apprehension that sits atop his sternum. 

_ Drink this.  _ Grillby sets a glass of water next to him, then begins to unwrap the blanket from Papyrus—Sans scowls at him for doing so, but is quite promptly ignored. As soon as the blanket is untangled, Grillby spreads it out and wraps it around Sans’ shoulders, tucking it around both him and Papyrus. Once he’s done, he takes a step back.

“So you won’t tell him?” Sans presses.

_ I will give you the chance to tell him first,  _ Grillby says, and Sans’ soul drops out of his chest. No no no no no— _ That is your right. If you refuse to speak with him, however, then I will. This isn’t something that can be ignored, and you are far too young to make such important decisions.  _

“No no no, Grillby you can’t tell him you can’t—”

_ I can, and I will. I’m sorry. I wish this wasn’t so difficult for you, but how is your father supposed to help you if you refuse to let him?  _

“I don’t want his help! I just want him to be  _ okay!”  _ Sans shouts, his voice cracking. Papyrus cringes, breathing quickly and fearfully. 

Grillby straightens his shoulders, and for a moment, he looks every inch a soldier.  _ You greatly underestimate your father, child. He is stronger than you give him credit for. You have seen him in moments of great weakness, but I do hope that hasn’t warped your view of him so badly as to think  _ him  _ weak.  _

“I don’t—he’s not—”

_ He is strong, and growing stronger every day. He would tear down the sky for you—and if anyone could, it would be him. It would be a pity for you to forget that.  _ Grillby looks hard at him, and Sans shrinks into himself.  _ I understand your want to protect him. I feel it, too, little one. Wings has been hurt badly, that is true, and he struggles with those hurts even now. But have you  _ seen  _ him, Sans? _

Sans glances up at him, uncertain.

_ Have you seen your father since you saw him falling down?  _ Grillby demands.  _ Have you looked at him since he came back to you? I don’t believe you have. When you look on him, you still see a monster tottering and weak and on the verge of falling. You see a monster who might be tipped over by the slightest push. I can assure you that that monster is not your father, not any longer. _

“...but how can you know?” Sans asks. “How can you be sure?”

_ Look at him!  _ Grillby says, with an earnest flair in his sign.  _ He’s incredible! He’s been working so hard to improve for you and Papyrus. His wounds are healing, he has no collar, he shifts at will, he’s back to work, he’s attending therapy regularly, he’s connecting with people—stars, Sans, he’s gotten so much stronger than he was. He’s certainly strong enough to take care of you the way you deserve to be taken care of. Why, I— _

Keys jingle outside of the house, and he and Grillby cut off as Dad whisks into the house on a blast of cold air. “Oh, it’s a chilly one out there,” he exclaims, pulling his purple knit hat off as he kicks the door shut out behind him. “I think there’s a storm blowing in. Hey, Fuku. Whatcha watching?”

“National Geographic.”

“Good choice, good choice. Where are—”

“In the kitchen.”

“Gotcha.” Footsteps head in their direction, and Dad appears in the kitchen entryway, his eyes bright. Snow dusts the shoulders of his overcoat, and he beams when he sees them. “Hey, you two—oh, three. Sorry, didn’t see you there, Paps.” When Sans and Grillby don’t return his enthusiasm, he wilts slightly. “Is everything, um, okay?”

Grillby glances in Sans’ direction. 

“Yeah!” Sans says, straightening up. Grillby looks away, his shoulders slumping, and guilt claws through Sans’ chest again. He takes a deep breath, and then he turns his eyes to his father and he  _ looks.  _

He sees a monster who has been irrevocably damaged, physically and emotionally. He sees a monster with splits in his skull and holes in his hands. He sees a monster who hoards fear and anger and  _ rot  _ in his chest. But he also...he also sees a monster who stands straight and tall in a brand-new overcoat, his eyelights gleaming brightly from the depths of his skull. He sees a monster who looks on him with endless affection and who leans against Grillby as though it’s the simplest thing in the world to rely on another. He sees a monster who looks forward, who laughs and teases and plays, who claws his way through every damned day and has done for centuries past. He looks, and he finally sees his father—a little broken, a little crooked, but still here, still happy, still persevering. 

Despite everything, it’s still him.

Sans laughs, and it cracks, and tears begin to roll down his cheeks again. Dad moves towards him, alarmed. “Sans? What’s wrong? What is it?”

“I think,” Sans says, his smile wobbling, “I need to talk to you, Dad.”

Behind Dad, Grillby inclines his head.

“Of course, sweetheart,” Dad says, scooping him off of the counter. Grillby gently takes Papyrus, and Sans wraps his arms around Dad’s neck and clings. “Grillby, would you mind staying just a little while longer?”

_ As long as you need, my dears,  _ Grillby says, touching Dad’s shoulder gently before heading back to the living room. 

Dad carries him upstairs, into his bedroom, and takes a seat on the bed. He fusses with the blanket, making sure Sans is securely ensconced before leaning back and meeting his eyes. “Now,” he says, cupping Sans’ face and wiping away his tears, “what did you need to talk about, Sans?”

So Sans tells him. Sans tells him everything. He tells him about his sickening fear of abandonment, his constant uncertainty, how strange and unsafe everything feels. He tells him about his flashback, and about his nightmares, and about the times he only pretends to sleep and then sneaks into Dad’s bed because he can’t stand being away from him for that long. He tells him about the ugly rot in his own soul. 

The entire time, Dad sits and listens and rocks them both gently. He leans his head against Sans’ skull once he’s finished, and Sans can feel a few of his father’s own tears spatter against his shoulder. “Oh, my little one,” he whispers, his voice cracked, and Sans’ throat aches. “My little, little one. Thank you for telling me. That was so very brave of you.”

Then Sans is crying again—great, jagged sobs of fear and anger and misery and _relief_ because his father isn’t falling apart anymore even though the whole world is. Dad squeezes him gently, croons quiet comfort, and never once tells him to stop. 

“It’s alright,” he says, instead. “It’s alright, baby boy, you can cry. You don’t have to hold everything in. I’m here, Daddy’s here. I’ve got you. You’re so brave, you’re so strong—we’re gonna get through this, okay? All of us. We’re gonna be alright.”

...Sans thinks, maybe, that he’s telling the truth. He curls his fingers into Dad’s coat and wails like he hasn’t since he was an infant, burying his face against his father’s chest and gulping in breaths that smell like snow and stale bone and the university. “Dad,” he says, because that’s the one thing that has always, always been in his life—from the very moment he was conceived, his father was there, talking and laughing and learning him. “I’m so sc-scared, Dad.”

“Shh, I know, honey, I know. It’s okay to be scared. You aren’t going to feel this way forever, I promise. I’m gonna help you through this, and so is everyone else. So many people love you, so many people want to help.” And then, most importantly:  _ “I _ love you, Sans. I’m going to do everything I can to make you feel better again.”

Sans presses his forehead to Dad’s chest and weeps, tears rolling down his cheeks and wobbling from his jaw. Dad rubs his back in slow circles, still rocking him gently, clicking tiny skeleton kisses across his skull. He hums low and sweet—an old, familiar lullaby.  _ Baby Mine,  _ Sans thinks, the very first thing his father ever sang to him. It puts a bittersweet ache between his ribs, and when Dad stops, Sans tugs at his jacket until he starts again.

But even that lullaby has to end, eventually. All things do.

Sans pushes himself back, putting a hand on Dad’s chest. “Dad?”

“Yeah, kiddo?” Dad asks, a wobbly smile on his face and tear tracks on his face.

“I love you too, okay?”

Dad’s wobbly smile grows a little bigger and a little wobblier. “Yeah?” he whispers. “I’m glad to hear that, Sans.”

Then they’re both crying again, clinging to each other, giggling and grinning and hurting and healing. They talk for hours, after that. They talk about flashbacks and post traumatic stress disorder, about therapy and soulrot, about going to school and separation anxiety, about Papyrus and Grillby and Asgore and Alphys and Fuku and their great, big family of friends. They talk until their voices are hoarse and their tears have run dry. 

Then and only then does Dad tuck him into bed, pressing one final kiss to his forehead. “Goodnight, little one,” he whispers. “I’ll see you tomorrow. We’ve got a lot of work to do, but things are going to be okay. You’ll see.”

Sans nods sleepily and cuddles up with the pillows. Dad and Papyrus join him there a few minutes later, and they fall asleep in a tangled mess of bony limbs and blankets. Just before he joins his brother and father in sleep, Sans steals a moment to think about what Dad said. A lot of work, huh? Sans...isn’t much for work, he’ll be the first to admit. But for this? For this life with them, with their friends, happy and safe and secure?

Yeah. Yeah, he thinks he can put in a little bit of work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact: the music for this chapter is [ “take me down easy”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMAlQkFyV_M) by james henry jr, if you want some more feelings :D


	35. epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “P.S. please if you get a chanse put some flowrs on Algernons grave in the bak yard.” — _Flowers for Algernon_ by Daniel Keyes

“Are you ready?” Gaster asks, adjusting Sans’ backpack for him one last time. Down the hallway, kindergartners stream into their homeroom for their very first day of school. Some of them look absolutely petrified—others look ecstatic. More than one has a parent (much like Gaster himself) hovering nervously over their shoulder and vying for the teacher’s attention.

“Yeah!” Sans says, bouncing on his toes. His eyes dart towards the classroom, then back towards Gaster, eyelights shining brightly—with anxiety, certainly, but also with excitement. 

“Are you sure? Because if you’re not, we can always try again later. There’s no shame in waiting just a little longer.”

“Dad, I’m  _ ready,”  _ Sans says, giggling and gently pushing Gaster’s hands away from his bag. “I’ll be fine, you big worrywart.”

“Alright, alright.” Gaster straightens up, taking a deep breath and looking down at him. His smile wobbles. “Oh, god, no! I said I wasn’t going to do it, I said I wasn’t going to cry—”

Sans laughs and hugs Gaster’s leg. “It’s  _ okay.  _ I’ll see you in, like, eight hours. I’m gonna go in now. You ready?”

“Yes, yes, you’re right.” Gaster sniffles, patting Sans’ skull fondly before wiping his eyes. “I think I’m ready.”

“You sure?” 

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m sure. Let’s do this.” Gaster holds out his hand, and Sans high-fives him enthusiastically. “Go get ‘em, tiger. You’re gonna be awesome.”

Sans beams at him, then hitches his backpack up and races into the classroom. Gaster follows more sedately, hovering abashedly in the doorway until he can catch the teacher’s attention. No way in  _ hell  _ is he leaving his son with someone he’s never even  _ met— _ overprotective, he knows, but he’ll be damned if he cares. As he waits, he sees Sans slip into a seat at a short, colorful table. A tiny orange kitten (with the  _ bushiest  _ tail Gaster has ever seen) sits across from him, ears pricked in curiosity. Sans hesitates when their eyes land on him, and it’s the kitten who breaks the ice. They lean forward, saying something too quietly for Gaster to hear, and a wide grin spreads across Sans’ face. The two of them begin to chatter enthusiastically, after that, and some tight, worried thing in Gaster’s chest starts to loosen. 

“Well, hello there. You must be Sans’ father.”

He starts in surprise, whipping his eyes back to the teacher—they’re a meerkat, he thinks, although he has to admit he’s not exactly well-versed in his exotic mongoose species. They approach him, offering him a tiny, dark paw to shake. He takes it carefully—delicate claws prickle against his bones, but the smile they offer him is charming and kind.

“I’m Blue,” they say—named, doubtless, for the odd color of their fur. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I look forward to having Sans in class—I hear he’s got quite the little personality. Ms. Darcy just loved having him in class last year, even if it was only for a short while.”

Gaster grins, rubbing the back of his neck. “Well, I’m glad to hear it. He’s a goofball, and he’s bright, too. He shouldn’t give you any trouble—but, you know, if he does, he’s—well, he’s been through a lot this past year, and he’s just learning to cope and—”

“It’s alright,” they assure him, resting their paw on his arm. “I’ll keep an eye out for him. You don’t need to worry. But if you’ll excuse me, I do believe it’s almost time for morning math. I’ll see you at three.”

Gaster takes that gentle dismissal for what it is, slipping out of the classroom and taking a deep breath. Sans is going to be fine, just fine. Gaster has nothing to worry about. He’s not going to cry. He’s not, he’s not, he’s  _ not. _

He makes it out of the school building, and then he’s weeping.

“First time’s always the hardest,” a soft voice says, and he turns to find Erika standing next to him. One of her children—a tiny white bunny with a twitching pink nose—hides behind her skirt, peeking shyly out at Gaster. Erika rests one hand between her daughter’s ears, then sets the other hand on his shoulder. “He’ll be just fine, Dr. Gaster.”

“You think?”

“I know. Now, hop along. How about a cinnabunny, on me?”

He walks with her back to the shop, and the two of them split a cinnabunny as they trade stories of their children and families. Erika’s daughter takes a seat on the floor, and a bundle of glossy black—feathers? chicken? is that a  _ chicken? _ —plunges into her lap. The bunny giggles, petting the chicken’s head gently and beginning to speak softly it. Gaster clears his throat, and the chicken’s head whips around. It fixes him with a piercing gaze which he can only determine to be utterly malevolent. He is fairly certain this chicken hates him more than he has ever been hated before in his life.

“Chicken,” he says conversationally to Erika, sweat beading on his skull.

“Oh, yes,” Erika says. “The newest member of the family. She just showed up one day and Zu insisted we keep her. I don’t particularly understand it; they bicker all the time, you know.”

Right on cue, the tiny bunny begins to grumble at the chicken, who fluffs her feathers and harrumphs in response. Gaster leaves the shop quite a bit more unnerved than he entered, and he swears he can feel the chicken’s eyes on his back all the way to the university. There are things in this world, he supposes, that even he will not live long enough to solve the mysteries of—chickens being one of them. 

As he enters the university, Dr. Urig greets him enthusiastically. She’s a terribly friendly raptor, always dressed in elegant black suits and ready to banter with him about the morals of business and science, but her volume control leaves something to be desired. Still, her friendliness had gone a long way towards making him feel welcome when he’d first started here. He tries to return her enthusiasm as he pours himself a cup of tea in the lobby, although he finds himself rather lost when it comes to the business laws she speaks so passionately about. 

“By the way, can’t help but notice,” Dr. Urig says, walking alongside him as he heads to his office, “where’s the little guy?”

“Which one?”

“The  _ little  _ little one?”

“Oh, Grillby’s bringing him along before he goes to work for the day. The less time he spends in the nursery the better, you know?” Gaster says, dunking his teabag in his mug.

“He lets you  _ and  _ Sans leave him, now? What progress!”

A grin flickers across Gaster’s face—what progress indeed. It had taken months to keep Papyrus from clawing the walls to shreds the minute Gaster and Sans left him at the same time, but damn if they haven’t managed it. Gaster, too, feels better about leaving his boys now. He still doesn’t feel  _ good  _ about it, but he worries significantly less, and when he  _ does  _ worry, he knows how to stop himself before he spirals. Dr. Williams has been an absolute blessing.

Dr. Urig leaves him with his tea, skittering off to teach their own lecture shortly before 9:00. Gaster’s own lecture goes as smoothly as it ever does (which is to say, not as smoothly as he wants it to, but not terribly). His students are inquisitive, bright—and, more often than not, mischievous little punks. He adores them, and he’d like to think most of them like him, too. 

At noon, he makes a beeline for the nursery. “Papyrus Papyrus Papyrus Papyrus,” he coos, leaning over the half-door to the infant room. “I’m here for Papyrus, ma’am.”

“I never would have guessed.” Mira levels him with an amused gaze, heading for a cradle near the edge of the room. He’d been surprised to meet her, the first time—she’s a fire elemental, he supposes, soft and yellow. She reminds him terribly of Grillby. It must be that resemblance, he supposes, that allows him to feel safe leaving Papyrus in her care so often. Papyrus seems to like her, too. He makes a point of this fact by babbling enthusiastically at her as she scoops him from his cradle, snuggling him close to her and cooing gently. 

When Mira hands him his son, Papyrus beams and reaches up to pat his face. Gaster nuzzles into his hand, clicking his teeth happily. “Daddy missed you,” he says, “yes he diiiiid, he missed you so much—how was your morning, little one? Do anything exciting?”

“He built a castle with me, actually,” Mira says. “He’s very creative, and quite good at building.”

“Are you? Are you good at building? I bet you are!” Gaster nuzzles his nose against Papyrus', and Papyrus grabs his cheekbones and squeezes very, very enthusiastically. Gaster, wincing, begins to gently pry tiny fingers off of his face. He takes Papyrus with him to the dining hall for lunch, and Papyrus still looks warily at the students and faculty swarming around them—but he doesn’t growl, and he doesn’t flinch when Dr. Boulger and Dr. Urig sit down beside him. 

After lunch, Gaster drops Papyrus back off with Mira, then goes to teach his afternoon lectures. Once the workday’s over, he packs his textbooks and binders into his messenger bag and picks Papyrus up again. The two of them head to Grillby’s, where Gaster finds his partner scrubbing the bar to within an inch of its life.

“Think it’s clean enough there, hotshot?” he teases, and Grillby rolls his eyes fondly. “C’mere.”

Grillby crosses over to him, and Gaster offers him a quick kiss before nuzzling into his throat, where it’s warm and bright and safe. Grillby rubs his back, squeezing the nape of his neck before gently pushing him back.  _ So?  _ he asks.  _ How was work? _

“It was wonderful,” Gaster says, and Papyrus reaches up to pat Grillby’s face solemnly. “How’s Sans?”

_ Equally wonderful. He’s in the back room playing, if you want to see him. _

Gaster carries Papyrus into the back room, where they find Sans sprawled out on the couch and playing on Grillby’s phone. Papyrus squeals with delight, and Gaster deposits him into Sans’ lap. Sans grins, hugging his baby brother tightly before glancing up at Gaster. 

“Hey,” he says. “What’s up, old man?”

Gaster takes a seat on the end of the couch. Sans props his feet in Gaster’s lap. “Work as usual. I’m more interested in how  _ your  _ day was—did school go well? Did you learn a lot?”

“Yeah, actually. It was pretty fun,” Sans says, letting Papyrus study one of his hands. “I missed you guys, though.”

“We missed you too.”

“Do you ever think it’ll stop?”

“What? Us missing each other?”

“Yeah.”

“I don’t know,” Gaster admits. “Do you want it to stop?”

Sans presses his hand against Papyrus’, aligning their tiny fingers. “I don’t know.”

Gaster reaches out and ruffles a hand gently over Sans’ skull. After a moment of quiet contemplation, in which he comes up with no better answer, he says “C’mon, kiddo. Let’s go help Grillby with dinner, and then we can go over your homework.”

The three of them move into the kitchen. Gaster helps Grillby toast hamburger buns while Sans and Papyrus bring ingredients (and, more often than not, act as preliminary taste-testers). Fuku arrives home just in time for dinner, and they eat together, although Grillby has to dart out every few minutes to tend to his customers. After dinner, they say their goodbyes.

“Thanks for everything today,” Gaster says, squeezing Grillby’s hand before leaning forward to click a soft kiss across his forehead. Grillby’s flames dance pink. “I love you.”

_ I love you too, dear. See you tomorrow? _

“And every tomorrow after.” Gaster beams at him, then shepherds his children back to their house. He and Grillby have discussed moving in together, but they’ve decided that neither of them are ready for yet—and that’s alright. They have time. They have plenty of time, now. Sans and Papyrus bound in front of him as they head back, tromping through the snow and squealing at each other. 

When they get home, Gaster herds them upstairs for baths, then helps Sans with his homework while Papyrus plays with blocks. Once he finally has the two of them tucked into bed (although he suspects they’ll be sneaking into his bed later tonight), he takes his own shower and makes himself a mug of tea. For several long minutes, he stands out on the porch and watches the snow fall. It’s a peaceful night, quiet.  Somewhere in the distance, an owl hoots, and a grimace crosses Gaster’s face, but that’s all it is: a grimace. It doesn’t send him spiraling down a chain of black thoughts. It just hurts, and then he lets it go and sips his tea and thinks about the physics lab tomorrow, about making dinner with Grillby, about his sun and sky sleeping soundly behind him. He thinks about how everything is going to be okay. 

Then Gaster goes inside, and he sleeps. His dreams are dark, ominous things, but when he wakes he has a son curled up on either side of him, and that makes just about everything better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaaAAAAAAAAA AND WE'RE FINISHED !!!!! i can't believe we've made it this far but im so so thrilled that we have! thank you so much to everyone who's read and offered their support; i couldn't have done it without you guys and im absolutely delighted that you enjoyed reading this fic as much as i enjoyed writing it! a giant thank you to the silent readers, and to everyone who's left a comment or kudos or drawn fanart or sent asks on tumblr! i suPER DUPER APPRECIATE ALL OF IT !!! writing this fic has been a great learning experience all the way around! im definitely going to miss writing the skelefam and their friends, as well as getting to talk with you guys!! but it's been a great time, and im so glad i got to be a part of it <33
> 
> to celebrate algernon's ending, im gonna be reblogging all of its fanart over on my [tumblr!](https://parsnipit.tumblr.com) if you guys want to send asks to the characters, i'll gladly answer those, too, as their final send-off :D
> 
> fun fact: there are a Bunch of ocs in this chapter. in order of appearance, they are: the friendly orange kitten sans meets, pyrrhus, who belongs to @ǝןǝɯǝnʇɐןɔɹʎdʇ. the meerkat teacher is blue, made by @aeris-blue. erika’s newest daughter is zu, belonging to @zartblog. the chaotic halestorm of destruction (#chickenedition) is henrietta, and she belongs to a-big-chicken-nerd. the business raptor is the business raptor and belongs to @ksenya-and-the-artistic-cucumber. the star elemental is mira, made by @minehertisrote. thank you all for your continued support and friendship (and for letting me borrow your characters for a little while !!!!!!!!)
> 
> and i think !!! that is all !!! thank you all so so much again, and i hope you all find your happy endings, too!!! <333


End file.
